_ T\r  ■  > _ 1"~-  - _ 

BT  265  , W38  1923 

Watt,  Gordon,  1865- 

The  meaning  of  the  cross 


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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


https://archive.org/details/meaningofcrossstOOwatt 


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The  Meaning  of 
The  Cross 


Studies  of  the  Cross  of  Christ 
throughout  the  Bible 


Showing  the  central  place 
of  the  Cross  in  salvation, 
victory,  power,  and  service 


BY 


THE  REV.  GORDON  WATT,  M.  A. 


PHILADELPHIA 

THE  SUNDAY  SCHOOL  TIMES  COMPANY 


i 


COPYRIGHT,  1923,  BY 

THE  SUNDAY  SCHOOL  TIMES  COMPANY 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


CONTENTS 


I.  The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross .  5 

II.  Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross .  18 

III.  The  Message  of  the  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament  31 

IV.  The  Cross  in  the  Gospels .  45 

V.  The  Cross  in  the  Epistles .  60 

VI.  The  Cross  in  the  Revelation .  74 

VII.  The  Mold  of  the  Cross .  86 

VIII.  The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross .  97 

IX.  Following  the  Lamb  :  The  Way  of  the  Cross .  112 


These  studies  of  the  Cross  of 
Christ  were  given  as  daily  messages 
at  the  Summer  Conference  of  the 
Victorious  Life  Testimony  held  in 
July,  1922,  at  Stony  Brook,  Long 
Island,  New  York.  In  reporting  that 
conference  The  Sunday  School  Times 
said :  “At  nine  o’clock  that  first 
Lord’s  Day  morning  the  Rev.  Gordon 
Watt,  of  Scotland,  gave  the  first  of  his 
unforgettable  series  of  studies  of  the 
Cross  of  Christ.  Each  morning  of  the 
eight  days,  and  again  at  the  closing 
service,  Mr.  Watt  brought  from  the 
Word  of  God  treasures  new  and  old 
on  the  Cross.  If  one  wonders  how  it 
were  possible  to  give  nine  extended 
addresses  to  the  same  audience  of 
Christians  and  always  on  the  single 
theme  of  the  Cross,  one  has  yet  to  gain 
new  blessings  from  the  great  central 
theme  of  the  entire  Bible.” 


THE  MEANING  OF  THE  CROSS 

I 

THE  THREEFOLD  ASPECT  OF  THE  CROSS 

IT  IS  very  essential  that  we  should  have  a  right  under¬ 
standing  of  the  cross,  of  what  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
through  his  death,  has  really  accomplished;  because  vic¬ 
tory  for  the  daily  life  depends  upon  how  we  enter  into  the 
fullest  experience  of  the  cross  »and  stand  there  in  and  with 
Christ.  So  let  us  just  begin  at  the  very  beginning.  John 
3:7  is  the  first  aspect  of  the  cross:  “Marvel  not  that  I 
said  unto  thee,  Ye  must  be  born  again.”  There  is  nothing 
for  us  unless  we  have  come  there.  What  the  Lord  calls 
“the  new  birth”  is  just  the  door  into  the  riches  of  our 
inheritance*  in*  grace.  I  trust  we  have  all  passed  through 
the  door. 

What  does  the  new  birth  mean  ?  It  means  new  life,  new 
life  whereby  we  become  the  children  of  God,  even  as  by 
natural  birth  we  are  the  children  of  our  parents.  Now 
how  is  that  brought  about?  John  1 :  12,  13,  “But  as  many 
as  received  him  [the  Lord  Jesus],  to  them  gave  he  power 
[or  authority]  to  become  the  sons  [or  children]  of  God, 
even  to  them  that  believe  on  his  name :  which  were  born, 
not  of  blood  [we  are  not  born  Christians],  nor  of  the  will 
of  the  flesh  [we  are  not  the  children  of  God  through  any 
self  effort],  nor  of  the  will  of  man  [a  man  is  not  a  Chris¬ 
tian  because  some  other  body  says  he  is  a  Christian  or 
looks  like  a  Christian  or  lives  like  a  Christian],  but  of 
God.” 


5 


6 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


The  new  birth  becomes  an  actual  experience  the  moment 
that  we  receive  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as  our  Saviour.  By 
that  act,  on  the  ground  of  the  atoning  sacrifice  of  the  Son 
of  God,  we  receive  new  life,  even  the  life  of  God;  we  pass 
into  a  new  stage,  that  of  spiritual  regeneration,  regenera¬ 
tion  by  the  Holy  Spirit ;  and  we  enter  into  a  new  position, 
that  of  being  the  children  of  God. 

Now  I  dare  not  and  can  not  emphasize  too  strongly 
the  necessity  of  the  new  birth,  simply  because  the  new 
birth  produces  the  new  creation,  and  the  new  creation  is 
God’s  imperative  demand  and  requirement  for  new  life 
and  for  new  service. 

One  of  our  old  Scottish  preachers  once  said,  “All  man¬ 
kind  hangs  either  at  the  cradle  of  Adam  or.  at  the  cradle 
of  Christ,”  and  we  have  to  choose.  I  venture  to  say  that 
the  ordinary  church-goer  has  little  or  no  idea  of  the  mean¬ 
ing  of  that,  and  yet  it  is  one  of  the  essential  facts  of  the 
Word  of  God.  The  old  head  of  the  race  was  Adam,  and 
Adam  failed  and  fell,  and  the  old  creation  failed  in  him 
and  fell  with  him.  It  is  very  important  to  be  quite  clear 
about  that.  I  want  to  quote  from  a  great  Bible  teacher: 
“If  man  never  fell,  then  the  Christ  of  the  Gospels  lived 
and  taught  and  died  unnecessarily.”  These  are  words  that 
ought  to  be  placarded  abroad  to-day :  “That  man  is  con¬ 
sistent  who  abandons  all,  rather  than  he  who,  professing 
still  to  own  allegiance  to  Christ,  denies  some  parts  of  the 
whole.”  It  is  a  pity  that  all  of  our  liberal  theologians  could 
not  read  these  words.  These  are  words  by  J.  Campbell 
Morgan  in  the  introduction  to  the  book  of  Genesis  in  his 
Analyzed  Bible. 

Human  nature  as  in  Adam  has  fallen.  It  is  not  incap¬ 
able,  mark  you,  of  reaching  high  levels  of  nobility  and 
goodness  according  to  human  standards,  but  finds  it  an 
utter  impossibility  to  adjust  itself  to  the  requirements  of 
God’s  holiness.  And  the  fallen  nature  is  the  material 
through  which  the  self  life  is  always  manifesting  itself. 
It  is  on  that  that  Satan  is  continually  working  in  order  to 
produce  failure  and  weakness  and  loss  in  us,  and  unless 


The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross  7 

we  come  to  this  point,  to  which  the  great  apostle  Paul  was 
brought  by  the  sheer  logic  of  his  own  intellect  and  per¬ 
sonal  experience  in  the  face  of  sin,  we  can  never  be  in 
the  position  where  we  can  say  truthfully,  “There  is  there¬ 
fore  now  no  condemnation  to  them  which  are  in  Christ 
Jesus.”  That  is  only  possible  in  its  fullest  sense  for  the 
one  who  understands  what  God  has  done  with  the  old 
creation. 

You  and  I  need  not  wonder  at  the  attempts  on  the  part 
of  the  enemy  to  banish  from  books,  from  many  sources, 
and  even  from  some  so-called  revisions  of  the  Bible,  all 
mention  of  the  truth  of  the  atonement,  because  the  atone¬ 
ment  is  the  proof  of  the  reality  of  the  foe.  And  you  need 
not  be  surprised  that  he  is  inciting  many  men  to-day  to 
cover  with  ridicule  and  scorn  the  fact  of  the  fall,  because 
the  fall  is  the  proof  of  the  necessity  of  the  atonement. 
These  two  things  go  together,  and  here  throbs  the  very 
heart  of  the  Gospel  to  a  lost  and  ruined  race.  The  old 
head  of  the  race  failed  God,  and  the  old  creation  failed 
with  the  head ;  but  God  has  a  new  head,  even  Christ  Jesus, 
his  own  Son,  and  he  is  getting  a  new  creation.  When 
Christ  went  to  the  cross  he  took  the  old  creation,  which 
was  the  offspring  of  the  fall,  to  the  cross  with  him,  just 
because  there  was  no  other  way  by  which  God  could  get 
his  new  creation  and  man  could  experience  deliverance 
and  liberty. 

The  old  creation,  no  matter  how  commendable  it  may 
be  from  human  standpoints, — and  I  grant  everything  that 
could  be  said  in  its  favor, — the  old  creation  is  under  the 
curse  of  God,  it  is  under  the  sentence  of  death,  it  has  been 
condemned  in  Christ,  and  the  only  way  in  which  a  man 
can  be  set  free  from  the  curse  is  to  be  born  over  again, 
re-made  in  Christ,  identified  with  Christ  in  his  death,  for 
“Christ  hath  redeemed  us  from  the  curse  of  the  law.” 

That  is  the  foundation  truth  of  the  Gospel.  That  is  the 
foundation  fact  for  Christian  life  and  for  Christian  serv¬ 
ice.  That  is  the  first  aspect  of  the  cross. 


8 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


The  Second  Aspect  of  the  Cross. — Now  shall  we  turn 
to  Romans  6 : 6,  which  is  the  second  aspect  of  the  Cross : 
“Knowing  this,  that  our  old  man  is  crucified  with  him, 
that  the  body  of  sin  might  be  destroyed,  that  henceforth 
we  should  not  serve  sin.”  That  came  by  a  revelation  to 
Paul.  It  will  come  to  you  in  the  same  way.  “Knowing 
this,  that  our  old  man  is  crucified  with  Christ.”  It  is  very 
necessary  to  make  this  perfectly  clear,  that  God’s  plan  of 
salvation  embraces  no  scheme  for  the  betterment  of  the 
old  man.  There  is  only  one  place  for  it  and  that  is  the 
cross,  the  place  of  death. 

That  is  the  starting  point  of  the  victorious  life,  “Know¬ 
ing  this,  that  our  old  man  is  crucified  with  Christ.”  Let 
us  just  notice  this,  that  our  crucifixion  with  Christ  is  as 
complete  a  one  as  Christ’s  crucifixion  for  us.  Just  as 
Christ  was  crucified  for  us  and  for  our  sins,  so  we  have 
been  crucified  with-  him.  Each  one  of  these  works  is 
finished.  That  is  a  fact  of  God,  eternal,  unalterable,  on 
which  our  faith  is  to  rest  for  continuous  victory  and 
deliverance.  The  whole  secret  of  victory  in  the  Christian 
life  is  simply  understanding  our  attitude  to  that  fact,  and 
asserting  our  position  in  relation  to  that  fact,  and  then 
maintaining  that  attitude  in  the  face  of  every  assault*  of 
Satan  and  every  attempt  on  the  part  of  the  old  man  to 
reassert  its  supremacy  in  our  characters  and  in  our  lives. 
Remember  it  is  not  sin  that  dies,  it  is  not  self  that  dies, 
it  is  not  temptation  that  dies,  it  is  you  who  have  to  die. 
Their  attitude  never  changes;  yours  has  to. 

Now  what  is  your  attitude?  Romans  6:11  speaks  of 
reckoning:  '“Likewise  reckon  ye  also  yourselves  to  be 
dead  indeed  unto  sin,  but  alive  unto  God  through  Jesus 
Christ  our  Lord.”  Faith  rests  on  the  fact  of  God  and  the 
act  of  Christ,  and  reckons  that  fact  to  be  true  because  of 
the  act.  What  does  reckoning  mean?  Reckoning  is 
always  just  the  attitude  of  the  will — taking  the  place  of 
death  to  sin,  refusing  to  yield  to  sin,  setting  itself  continu¬ 
ally  after  God,  standing  with  set  purpose  of  heart  upon 
the  victory  which  has  been  won  for  us  by  the  Lord  Jesus 


The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross 


9 


Christ,  and  claiming  that  victory  at  every  point  of  the 
conflict,  “Reckon  ye  also  yourselves  to  be  dead  indeed 
unto  sin.”  And  you  conquer  your  sin,  not  by  struggling, 
not  by  fighting  with  it  in  your  own  strength,  but  by  dying 
to  it.  You  conquer  your  sin  by  dying  to  it. 

When  I  say  that  I  do  not  mean  there  is  no  more  con¬ 
quering.  You  and  I  never  can  sit  down  and  say  “The 
fight  is  over.”  There  is  not  only  a  rest  of  faith  to  be 
enjoyed  (that  is  blessedly  true),  but  there  is  a  fight  of 
faith  in  which  we  have  to  be  continually  engaged,  and 
one  of  the  greatest  needs  in  the  Christian  life  is  to  recog¬ 
nize  the  foe  as  well  as  the  methods  of  the  foe  by  which 
he  is  determined  to  reach  his  end.  It  is  not  enough  to 
say,  “Let  us  look  to  the  Lord  and  he  will  carry  us 
through.”  That  is  only  one  half  of  the  truth.  One  of  the 
weaknesses  of  many  Christians  to-day  is  that  they  are 
attempting  to  ignore  the  foe,  to  ignore  the  presence  of  a 
tremendous  personality  of  evil  in  the  world,  and  that  is 
just  about  as  wise  as  it  would  be  to  try  and  ignore  your¬ 
self.  If  you  shut  your  eyes  to  the  existence  of  the  enemy 
and  fail  to  discern  his  presence  and  his  power  you  are 
putting  yourself  at  as  great  a  disadvantage  in  spiritual 
conflict  as  any  general  would  if  he  went  into  a  fight  with¬ 
out  ever  making  any  use  of  his  intelligence. 

If  you  look  to  the  Lord  and  do  not  do  what  the  Bible 
tells  you  to  do,  watch,  you  cannot  pray  intelligently ;  you 
fail  to  recognize  the  movements  of  the  enemy  and  the 
methods  of  the  enemy.  If  you  watch  these  things  and 
do  not  look  to  the  Lord,  then  you  will  get  absolutely 
crushed  and  depressed  by  the  darkness  that  is  deepening 
around  you  and  by  the  awful  onrush  of  the  forces  of 
evil.  We  are  required  to  be  alert  to-day  to  evil  in  all  its 
various  forms,  also  to  its  source,  to  its  challenge,  to  its 
methods,  to  its  objectives ;  and  you  will  be  wise  to  give  to 
the  enemy  just  the  name  that  the  Bible  gives  to  him.  It 
is  this  that  makes  necessary  the  attitude  of  constantly  act¬ 
ing  upon  this  eternal  fact  of  God,  taking  your  place  with 
Christ  in  his  death  and  claiming  in  your  own  experience 


,10 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


the  power  of  that  death  manifested  in  the  victory  won  on 
the  cross.  It  is  that  which  keeps  you  in  touch  with  Christ 
to-day  in  the  conflict.  It  is  that  which  keeps  the  eye  of 
your  mind  clear  and  enables  you  to  see  the  path  and  to 
understand  what  God  means  you  to  do. 

What  is  the  great  secret  of  maintaining  this  attitude? 
Romans  8 : 2,  “The  law  of  the  Spirit  of  life  in  Christ 
Jesus  hath  made  me  free  from  the  law  of  sin  and  death.” 
Only  a  law  can  set  us  free  from  a  law.  If  Congress  passes 
a  law  that  proves  to  be  unworkable  or  unjust  it  has  to 
pass  another  law  in  order  to  set  the  country  free  from 
that  law.  That  is  true  here:  only  a  law  can  set  you  free 
from  a  law.  And  what  is  law?  It  is  just  the  steady 
pressure  of  a  power.  In  the  spiritual  conflict  there  are 
always  two  laws  at  work,  the  lower  law  of  the  self  oper¬ 
ated  on  by  Satan,  by  means  of  which  we  are  dragged 
■down,  and  the  higher  law  of  the  life  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  operated  on  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  by  which  he  is 
ever  seeking  to  lift  us  up  and  bring  us  into  the  place  o£ 
freedom  and  deliverance.  It  is  the  law,  the  higher  law 
of  the  Spirit  of  life  in  Christ  Jesus,  that  makes  us  free 
from  the  lower  law  of  sin  and  death.  Victory  in  the  con¬ 
flict  of  Christian  life  is  thus.  It  is  not  meeting  sin  in 
your  own  strength,  it  is  not  crushing  down  that  temper 
of  yours,  it  is  not  making  a  good  resolution  at  this  con¬ 
ference  and  saying,  “By  God’s  grace  I  will  never  give 
way  again  to  that  thing  that  has  so  often  brought  me 
low.”  God’s  way  of  victory  is  not  fighting  in  our  own 
strength,  it  is  dying. 

That  is  the  truth  I  believe  we  want  to  learn.  God’s 
way  of  victory  is  dying  to  sin,  and  God’s  way  is  always 
the  best  way,  God’s  way  is  always  the  surest  way  to  vic¬ 
tory.  God’s  way  is  learning  to  die  to  sin  and  to  conquer 
sin  by  dying  to  it,  asserting  our  position  of  union  with 
Christ  in  his  death,  and  giving  the  Holy  Spirit  the  opportu¬ 
nity  to  bring  in  the  higher  law,  the  law  of  the  Spirit  of 
life  in  Christ  Jesus. 

When  the  late  Andrew  Murray  of  South  Africa  came 


The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross  11 

over  to  England  twenty-seven  years  ago  he  met  a  number 
of  Christian  workers  in  London,  and  his  message  to  them 
was  simply  this:  “Two  bodies  cannot  occupy  the  same 
place;  if  one  comes  in  the  other  goes  out.  And  in  the 
measure  in  which  you  go  out  Christ  comes  in.”  That  is  vic¬ 
tory,  that  is  the  victorious  Christian  life.  Therefore  in  the 
measure  in  which  you  yield  to  the  Holy  Spirit,  the  law 
of  the  Spirit  of  life  will  come  into  you  and  drive  out  the 
law  of  sin  and  death  and  give  you  the  victory.  You  con¬ 
quer  by  dying. 

Let  us  note  this,  that  the  decisive  factor  in  the  conflict 
is  inside,  it  is  the  will.  The  decisive  factor  is  the  will,  a 
surrendered  will  to  co-operate  with  the  Holy  Spirit,  and- 
the  Holy  Spirit  can  do  nothing  for  you  and  for  me  unless 
he  has  our  co-operation.  Frances  Ridley  Havergal  puts  it 
in  this  way:  “There  must  be  full  surrender  before  there 
can  be  full  blessedness.  God  admits  us  by  the  one  into  the 
other.”  And  where  there  is  this  surrender  then  the  scheme 
of  the  evil  one  is  foiled.  But  the  solemn  thing  is  that 
where  there  is  not  this  surrender  the  plan  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  is  spoiled.  Therefore  let  us  not  pass  that  over 
without  thinking  seriously  about  it  and  asking  God  to 
make  it  mean  to  us  all  that  it  does  mean,  that  the  decisive 
factor  in  every  conflict  of  the  life  of  the  Christian  is  my 
will.  And  when  we  reach  the  position  where  we  co-oper¬ 
ate  with  the  Holy  Spirit,  there  he  works  into  us  the  power 
of  the  cross  and  makes  us  know  the  truth  of  victory.  That 
is  the  second  aspect  of  the  cross. 

The  Third  Aspect  of  the  Cross. — But  there  is  a  third 
aspect.  If  we  are  to  know  the  full  tide  of  victory,  I  am 
persuaded  of  this,  that  we  require  more  and  more  to 
recognize  that  behind  all  the  sin  is  this  great  foe  to  which 
I  have  referred,  and  if  we  are  to  win  the  victory  we  must 
occupy  the  position,  the  strategic  position,  which  God  has 
revealed  to  us. 

Why  was  it  that  Joshua  received  the  command  utterly 
to  exterminate  the  Canaanites  and  those  other  nations? 
You  will  find  it  in  the  seventh  chapter  of  Deuteronomy, 


12 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


those  first  few  verses  of  the  chapter,  that  tremendous 
command  of  God  that  he  was  utterly  to  destroy  those 
nations  and  not  allow  one  of  them  to  live.  Why  was  it? 
Because  it  was  necessary  for  the  health  of  the  people  and 
for  the  carrying  out  of  the  purposes  of  God,  just  as  on 
certain  occasions  he  has  had  to  act  in  the  same  way, 
and  sometimes  exterminate  a  people,  and  just  as  govern¬ 
ments  to-day  have  sometimes  to  deprive  a  man  of  his 
liberty  and  of  his  life  because  it  is  for  the  good  of  others, 
because  it  is  for  the  carrying  out  of  a  wider  purpose. 

When  Joshua  received  this  command  to  exterminate 
the  Canaanites  it  was  because  of  the  foe  that  was  behind 
them.  Their  religion  was  a  religion  of  spiritism.  It  was 
saturated  with  Satanic  power,  and  therefore  Joshua  was 
sent  to  war,  not  so  much  with  those  Canaanites  as  men  as 
with  the  awful  power  that  was  behind  them  and  that  was 
working  all  this  mischief.  If  we  are  to  know  the  fullest 
victory  our  attitude  must  be  the  same  as  God’s  attitude  to 
those  powers  of  evil. 

At  the  back  of  sin,  at  the  back  of  practically  everything 
that  is  happening  to-day  against  God  and  against  right¬ 
eousness  is  this  awful  foe  of  which  Paul  speaks  in 
the  sixth  chapter  of  Ephesians,  with  this  marvelous 
army,  this  disciplined  army  that  he  directs,  the  principal¬ 
ities  and  powers  of  evil.  Behind  the  sin  which  attacks 
you,  behind  all  this  apostasy  that  is  rushing  in  upon  the 
Church,  behind  all  these  methods  of  other  nations  that 
are  creating  such  problems  that  our  statesmen  are  being 
completely  baffled,  and  that  are  bringing  about  burdens 
that  are  breaking  men  and  nations  down,  stands  this 
implacable  foe  of  God ;  and  you  and  I  can  make  the  cross 
a  barrier  in  resisting  him,  in  attacking  him,  in  overcoming 
him. 

Now  turn  to  the  third  aspect  of  the  cross,  which  is 
found  in  Revelation  12 :  “And  they  overcame  him  by  the 
blood  of  the  Lamb,  and  by  the  word  of  their  testimony ; 
and  they  loved  not  their  lives  unto  the  death.”  Read  the 
book  of  Revelation  and  you  will  find  it  is  a  record  of  war 


The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross 


13 


between  the  Lamb  and  the  dragon ;  and  what  is  propheti¬ 
cally  true  of  the  future  is  spiritually  true  of  the  present. 

There  is  the  enemy  to-day,  more  bold,  more  open,  more 
defiant,  more  determined  than  any  general,  I  believe,  in 
the  past,  has  ever  had  any  experience  of,  and  to  know  that 
there  is  an  enemy  is  half  the  battle.  He  was  no  myth  to 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  He  is  no  myth  in  the  Bible,  and 
we  have  no  right  to  leave  people  in  ignorance  of  him  and 
his  workings  to-day.  There  are  many  causing  trouble  due 
directly  to  Satanic  influence,  and  the  very  essence  of  spir¬ 
itual  strategy  is  to  know  your  enemy,  and  then  to  know 
how  to  direct  the  power  God  gives  you  upon  him  at  the 
right  spot. 

Now  here,  just  in  a  word,  is  the  full  Gospel  of  grace — 
deliverance  from  sin,  deliverance  from  self,  from  the  old 
man,  and  deliverance  from  Satan  and  all  his  works.  How 
does  that  deliverance  come?  “They  overcame  him  by  the 
blood  of  the  Lamb.”  “Now  is  the  judgment  of  this  world. 
Now  shall  the  prince  of  this  world  be  cast  out,”  said  our 
Lord  Jesus  on  the  eve  of  Calvary.  And  when  he  hung 
there  on  the  cross,  crucified  in  utter  weakness,  that  weak¬ 
ness  became  the  power  of  God  by  which  he  expelled  the 
devil  from  his  place  of  sovereignty  in  the  world  and 
stripped  his  principalities  and  his  authorities  of  all  their 
power.  From  that  day  to  this  and  to  the  very  end  Satan 
is  a  defeated  foe,  and  the  purpose  of  God  is  that  you  and 
I  should  be  treading  him  under  foot. 

The  truth  is  that  there  are  many  Christians  to-day  who 
are  being  trodden  under  his  feet ;  and  that  is  not  in  God’s 
program  for  any  one  of  his  children.  He  is  exercising 
authority  in  lives  to-day  to  which  he  has  no  right  because 
he  is  defeated,  and  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  gives  to  you 
and  to  me  the  right,  the  authority,  the  privilege,  to  tread 
him  under  our  feet  and  to  know  in  experience  the  fulness 
of  the  victory  of  the  cross.  For  remember  the  victory  of 
the  cross  is  not  confined  to  our  salvation  from  sin  or  to 
our  victory  over  self,  it  embraces  the  indisputable  fact 
that  the  prince  of  this  world  has  been  judged  and  cast  out, 


14 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


and  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  the  Redeemer  of  the  world, 
gives  us  now  the  authority  to  bruise  the  serpent's  head. 

How  do  we  overcome  him  ?  That  is  a  wonderful  word, 
the  word  “overcome”  in  the  Greek.  If  you  were  in  a 
court  of  law  it  means  that  you  win  your  case.  I  fit  is  in 
a  conflict  it  means  that  you  have  knocked  the  weapon  out 
of  the  hand  of  your  adversary.  That  is  the  meaning  of  it. 
Here  they  overcame  him  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb., 

Satan  goes  into  the  presence  of  God  to  accuse  the  be¬ 
liever,  and  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  you  win  your  case 
at  the  great  court  of  appeal.  Satan  attacks  you  in  your  per¬ 
son,  through  your  mind,  through  the  circumstances  of  life, 
but  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  you  can  knock  the  weapon 
out  of  your  adversary’s  hand,  “And  they  overcame  him 
by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb.” 

Remember  that  is  the  basis  of  all  God’s  dealings  with 
you  and  with  me,  and  it  has  to  be  the  basis  of  all  our 
opposition  to  Satanic  interference  in  our  lives.  The  fin¬ 
ished  work  of  Christ  on  Calvary  is  the  weapon  by  which 
you  and  I  can  fight  the  good  fight  of  faith  with  perfect 
success.  And  bear  in  mind  that  the  cross  is  the  only  place 
where  Satan  admits  defeat.  It  is  the  one  and  only  place  in 
the  universe  of  God  where  the  great  enemy  has  been  con¬ 
quered.  It  is  the  one  and  only  place  where  you  and  I 
can  have  victory,  and  therefore  we  have  got  to  choose  to 
stand  there  and  resist  him  and  claim  the  victory.  “They 
overcame  him  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb.” 

“Precious  blood,  by  this  we  conquer  in  the  fiercest  fight, 

Sin  and  Satan  overcoming  by  its  might.” 

Then  John  goes  on  to  tell  us  something  more,  that  they 
overcame  him  by  the  word  of  their  testimony.  That  is 
a  great  deal  more  than  getting  up  in  a  meeting  and  saying, 
“Twenty  years  ago  I  was  saved.”  T estimony  here  means 
co-operating  with  the  Holy  Spirit  in  his  judgment  upon 
Satan.  And  what  is  his  judgment  upon  Satan?  That  he 
has  been  defeated  and  that  he  has  no  right  to  any  life. 
Testimony  here  means  entering  into  partnership  with  the 


The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross 


15 


Holy  Spirit  to  have  that  fact  carried  out  in  actual  experi¬ 
ence. 

How  is  it  to  be  made  effective?  You  have  got  to  go 
back  to  Romans  6 : 6,  and  you  have  got  to  learn,  and  I 
have  got  to  learn,  to  stand  upon  that  death  of  Christ  and 
ask  the  Holy  Spirit  to  make  it  all  that  it  means,  to  make  it 
a  fact  in  our  experience  every  moment  and  every  moment. 
There  has  to  be  the  perpetual  attitude  of  reckoning  myself 
dead  to  this  and  that  sin  as  Satan  attacks  me  every  day. 
Then  there  has  to  be  the  perpetual  aggressiveness  of  the 
Spirit  against  him  and  all  his  works. 

You  take  your  sin,  the  sin  you  know  is  your  besetting 
sin,  the  thing  you  sometimes  call  just  a  failing,  an  infirm¬ 
ity.  Perhaps  you  have  never  yet  come  to  call  it  a  sin. 
The  sooner  you  begin  to  give  it  its  right  name  the  better. 
Take  your  sin  and  stand  on  the  death  of  Jesus  Christ 
against  that  sin  and  claim  the  victory  that  there  is  in 
Calvary  for  you  when  joined  to  the  living  Christ.  Close 
by  faith  every  avenue  into  your  being  against  that  sin 
and  other  sins. 

Take  your  environment,  take  your  home,  take  your 
business,  with  all  its  duties  and  tests  and  trials  and  irri¬ 
tations,  take  the  circumstances  of  life;  learn  to  stand  there 
in  death  union  with  Christ,  and  then,  by  faith  through  that 
cross,  claim  the  victory  against  every  foreign  power  that 
is  seeking  to  disturb  the  atmosphere  of  your  home  or  that 
is  seeking  to  cripple  you  or  lame  you  and  hinder  you  in 
business  or  through  circumstances. 

That  is  making  Christ  Lord  of  your  surroundings. 
That  is  entering  into  co-operation  with  the  Holy  Spirit 
for  the  deliverance  of  your  life  and  your  home  and  every¬ 
thing  else.  Take  your  work  for  Christ,  take  the  meetings, 
the  services ;  learn  to  stand  in  them  on  the  death  of  Christ 
and  claim  that  through  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  you  will 
get  victory  over  everything  by  which  Satan  would  seek  to 
hinder  you  in  that  service,  in  that  meeting. 

We  want  to  take  up  this  aggressive  attitude  of  spirit  in 
opposition  to  the  evil  one  and  bear  our  testimony  to  the 


16 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


fact  that  he  is  defeated  and  therefore  he  has  no  right 
here,  and  he  has  no  right  in  that  work,  and  he  has  no  right 
in  that  home  and  in  that  life.  Therefore,  in  the  name  of 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  we  can  turn  upon  him  and  bid 
him  go.  Remember  the  words  of  God,  “The  eternal  God  is 
thy  refuge,  and  underneath  are  the  everlasting  arms,”  and 
“He  shall  thrust  out  the  enemy  before  you,  and  destroy 
him.” 

In  this  conflict  you  will  find  that  there  are  two  things 
you  have  constantly  to  do.  You  have  constantly  to  come 
back  to  First  John  1 :  7  and  get  the  cleansing  of  the  blood 
through  faith,  and  healing  for  the  wounds.  Then  you 
have  to  come  back  again  and  again  to  Romans  6 : 6,  and 
in  the  face  of  every  attack  of  the  enemy  take  up  this  atti¬ 
tude  of  death,  it  is  the  only  bed  rock  position  for  the  vic¬ 
torious  Christian  life.  Stand  in  this  spirit,  and  then  trust 
the  Holy  Spirit  to  make  it  real  to  you. 

And  lastly,  John  says,  “They  loved  not  their  lives  unto 
the  death.”  That  is  simply  the  call  to  you  and  to  me  for 
the  fullest  surrender  of  will  and  of  life  in  order  to  give 
us  the  fullest  measure  of  victory.  Make  this  surrender 
each  day,  at  each  point  of  the  conflict.  Just  as  the  Holy 
Spirit  shows  you  what  God  asks,  then  obey  and  give  God 
all  and  he  will  give  you  all,  and  you  will  overcome  and 
share  in  his  mighty  victory. 

Prayer 

O  God ,  our  Father,  we  do  praise  and  magnify  thy  holy 
name  that  thou  hast  given  us  such  a  Saviour  and  such  a 
wonderfid  salvation  in  Jesus  Christ.  There  is  not  one 
who  is  not  conscious  of  his  need  of  that  salvation  and  of 
knowing  that  victory.  There  is  not  one  of  us,  forgiven  by 
thy  grace,  redeemed  by  thy  power,  who  has  not  a  constant 
battle  to  fight  with  the  old  creation  in  its  continuous  asser¬ 
tion  of  supremacy,  and  we  praise  thee  for  the  way '  of 
victory.  Teach  us  how  to  walk  in  it,  how  to  put  it  into 
practise,  how  to  experience  it. 

Our  Father,  there  are  some  things  that  are  very  difficult 


The  Threefold  Aspect  of  the  Cross 


17 


for  us  to  comprehend  with  our  minds.  May  we  put  our¬ 
selves  into  the  hands  of  the  Holy  Spirit  that  he  may  lead 
us  into  the  experience,  and  then  we  shall  know'  the  vic¬ 
tory.  There  is  not  one  of  us  who  is  not  becoming  in¬ 
creasingly  conscious  of  the  tremendous  personality  of 
evil  that  is  guiding  the  world ,  that  is  inciting  the  world, 
that  is  keeping  the  world  in  a  condition  of  unrest  and 
that  is  working  such  havoc  in  the  lives  of  people  to-day. 
Wilt  thou  teach  us  how  to  win  the  victory  over  him  as 
he  attacks  us. 

0  God,  our  hearts  leap  out  to  thee  in  faith  and  in 
praise  when  we  have  read  these  words,  uThey  overcame 
him  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb,  and  by  the  word  of  their 
testimony ;  and  they  loved  not  their  lives  unto  the  death.” 
What  has  been  true  of  others  can  be  true  of  us.  May 
there  be  nothing  in  our  lives  to  hinder  the  Holy  Spirit 
from  leading  us  in  these  days  into  the  fullest  experience 
of  the  life  that  thou  dost  bid  us  live.  We  ask  it  in  Jesus' 
name,  Amen. 


II 


OUR  INDEBTEDNESS  TO  THE  CROSS 

WE  SAW,  in  the  threefold  aspect  of  the  cross,  that 
the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus  redeems  us  from  sin 
and  brings  us  back  to  the  Father;  that  it  deals  with  the 
old  Adam  nature  in  each  one  of  us,  which  is  the  source 
of  our  weakness  and  trouble,  and  just  as  we,  by  faith  on 
the  authority  of  God’s  Word,  take  up  the  position  of 
death  in  and  through  Christ  to  every  form  of  self  life 
and  maintain  that  attitude  hour  by  hour,  we  live  the  life 
of  continuous  deliverance  and  victory.  We  saw  also  that 
the  cross  is  the  great  weapon  which  the  Lord  puts  into 
our  hands  to  defeat  the  devil  and  to  resist  the  pressure 
of  the  forces  of  evil,  and  to  scatter  the  powers  of  dark¬ 
ness,  to  deliver  souls  and  to  keep  our  own  feet  from  falling. 

“Unto  him  that  loved  us,  and  washed  us  from  our 
sins  in  his  own  blood,” — this  tells  us  of  our  indebtedness 
to  the  cross,  what  we  owe  to  the  death  of  the  Son  of  God. 
I  am  going  to  turn  to  a  number  of  familiar  passages  which 
will  show  us  that  the  riches  of  all  our  blessings  through 
time  and  eternity  are  in  the  cross,  in  that  atoning  sacri¬ 
fice  of  the  Son  of  God  on  Calvary,  the  fulness  and  the 
wonderfulness  of  which  grow  the  greater  and  the  clearer 
as  we  stand  in  spirit  before  the  cross  and  seek  the  enlight¬ 
ening  grace  of  the  Holy  Spirit  to  understand  its  meaning 
and  to  enter  into  its  experience. 

18 


Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross  19 

First,  the  cross  marks  the  purpose  of  the  coming  of 
Christ  (1  Tim.  1:15),  “This  is  a  faithful  saying,  and 
worthy  of  all  acceptation,  that  Christ  Jesus  came  into  the 
world  to  save  sinners;  of  whom  I  am  chief/’  I  do  not 
state  that  first  fact  of  our  indebtedness  to  the  cross  simply 
to  remind  you  that  it  is  an  echo  of  the  Saviour’s  declara¬ 
tion  when  he  was  on  earth,  “The  Son  of  man  came  not 
to  be  ministered  unto,  but  to  minister,  and  to  give  his 
life  a  ransom  for  many” ;  but  that  is  a  fact  that  requires 
to-day  to  be  constantly  repeated  and  emphasized  in  the 
hearing  of  men  and  women,  that  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
came  to  die — not  to  live,  not  to  teach,  not  to  work 
miracles — he  came  to  die.  It  was  the  purpose  of  his 
birth  and  the  purpose  of  his  life  to  die,  because  he  came 
to  deal  with  sin. 

I  do  think  that  those  of  us  who  are  preachers  and 
teachers  should  in  these  days,  when  the  cross  is  being 
slighted  and  minimized  and  hidden  from  the  people,  take 
every  opportunity  that  God  gives  us  of  thrusting  the 
cross  into  the  vision  of  the  people,  as  Paul  thrust  it  into 
the  vision  of  the  Roman  and  the  Jew  and  the  Greek 
whenever  he  stood  before  them.  The  purpose  of  the 
coming  of  Christ  was  Calvary. 

Secondly,  the  cross  is  the  pledge  of  the  return  of  Christ 
and  the  reunion  of  loved  ones  who  have  gone  before.  In 
1  Thess.  4:  14-16,  we  read  these  words,  they  are  very  im¬ 
portant:  “For  if  we  believe  that  Jesus  died  and  rose 
again,  even  so  them  also  which  sleep  in  Jesus  will  God 
bring  with  him.  For  this  we  say  unto  you  by  the  word 
of  the  Lord,  that  we  which  are  alive  and  remain  unto 
the  coming  of  the  Lord  shall  not  go  before  them  which 
are  asleep.  For  the  Lord  himself  shall  descend  from 
heaven  with  a  shout.”  Our  faith  in  the  death  and  the 
resurrection  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  the  cause  of 
our  expectation  of  his  coming. 

A  friend  of  mine  was  speaking  about  the  coming  of 
the  Lord  to  a  prominent  minister  in  one  of  the  great 
cities  of  England,  and  the  minister  said,  “My  dear  fellow, 


20 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


it  is  a  beautiful,  poetic  dream.”  But  you  cannot  dismiss 
such  a  thing  as  the  coming  of  the  Lord,  that  occupies 
such  a  place  in  the  Word  of  God,  in  an  airy  fashion  like 
that. 

The  argument  of  the  apostle  Paul  is  simply  this,  if 
the  one  coming  of  the  Lord  was  a  deed  planned  in  the 
love  of  God  and  carried  out  by  the  power  of  God,  the 
other  coming  of  the  Lord  cannot  be  a  dream  only — the 
one  hangs  by  the  other,  the  one  is  the  cause  of  the  other, 
the  one  is  the  ground  of  the  other.  The  first  coming  of 
our  Lord  and  its  purpose  is  the  ground  of  our  hope  that 
the  second  coming  of  the  Lord  will  be  a  fact,  and  that 
its  purpose  will  be  realized.  To  the  denial  of  the  personal 
coming  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  the  answer  is  the  cross. 
You  must  do  away  with  the  cross  if  you  are  going  to 
call  the  coming  of  the  Lord  a  mere  poetic  dream  ( I  fancy 
of  a  few).  The  cross  is  the  pledge  of  the  return  of  Christ. 

Thirdly,  and  this  is  what  I  want  to  emphasize  most  of 
all,  the  cross  is  the  secret  of  life,  and  it  has  got  a  double 
secret  for  you  and  me.  First,  it  is  the  secret  of  our 
own  personal  life  (Gal.  2:20),  “I  am  crucified  with 
Christ:  nevertheless  I  live;  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth 
in  me.”  It  is  the  secret  of  one’s  own  personal  life.  The 
I  is  the  representative  of  the  self  life,  which  has  been 
the  cause  of  all  the  enmity  in  the  human  heart  towards 
God,  and  the  source  of  all  the  weakness  of  human  service 
for  God  ever  since  the  fall,  and  that  I  has  to  be  dealt 
with  by  the  cross. 

You  will  note  what  the  apostle  says,  it  is  not  self¬ 
crucifixion  that  the  cross  works  by,  but  co-crucifixion. 
We  are  crucified  with  Christ,  and  that  is  a  fact  of  God 
on  which  our  faith  is  to  rest  for  continuous  deliverance 
and  victory.  Christ’s  cross  is  my  cross.  I  want  to  get 
into  the  very  heart  of  that  and  know  what  it  means,  for 
I  believe  that  is  the  secret  of  personal  life  for  the  Chris¬ 
tian, — Christ’s  cross  is  my  cross.  I  consent  to  share 
Christ’s  cross.  I  consent  to  share  death  with  Christ 
through  the  cross  to  everything  which  is  opposed  to  the 


Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross 


21 


Father’s  will,  that'  everything  of  the  Father’s  purpose 
may  be  accomplished.  *  When  I  take  up  that  attitude  I 
find  the  I  dispossessed  and  Christ  living  in  me. 

That  does  not  make  me  a  machine ;  it  makes  me  a  new 
creature,  with  my  own  temperament  and  disposition  and 
personality,  but  with  a  new  source  for  my  life,  a  new 
spring  for  my  being,  out  of  which  flows  the  life  of  Christ, 
and  then  others  see — not  me,  but  Christ  living  in  me. 

A  gentleman  was  walking  down  one  of  the  streets  of 
our  city,  Glasgow,  when  he  saw  a  crowd  at  a  shop  door. 
Curiosity  took  him  there,  to  find  a  man  inside  the  shop 
selling  a  beautiful  picture.  He  was  describing  the  merits 
of  the  picture  to  the  people  before  him,  pointing  them  to 
this  corner  and  to  that  corner  and  showing  them  this, 
that,  and  the  other  thing,  and  all  the  time  he  was  speaking 
of  the  picture  he  was  never  seen,  he  was  behind  the  picture, 
and  only  the  picture  in  its  beauty  was  visible  to  the  people. 
That  is  the  way  to  witness  for  Christ,  that  is  the  mark  of 
the  crucified  life,  the  life  that  has  entered  into  the  secret 
of  life,  it  is  crucified  with  Christ.  Christ  crucified  is 
revealed  by  it.  That  is  the  way  to  witness  for  Christ, 
“Christ  liveth  in  me,”  Christ  seen  through  me — I  crucified. 

I  want  you  to  read  a  few  words  from  a  Scottish  theo¬ 
logian,  Dowdell.  I  found  them  in  the  church  vestry  of  a 
friend  of  mine,  and  if  I  may  venture  humbly  to  say  it, 

I  think  they  are  words  that  every  one  of  us  preachers 
and  teachers  ought  to  have  continually  before  us  for  the 
service  to  which  God  has  called  us:  “No  man  can  bear 
zvitness  to  Christ  and  to  himself  at  the  same  time.  No  man 
can  give  at  once  the  impression  that  he  himself  is  clever  ^ 
and  Christ  mighty  to  save.” 

That  is  the  secret  of  life.  That  is  the  mark  of  the  man 
or  the  woman  who  has  entered  into  the  great  secret  of  the 
cross  in  relation  to  his  or  her  personal  life. 

The  old  saints  were  very  fond  of  mottoes  and  symbols. 
One  of  their  favorite  symbols  was  a  picture  of  the  face 
of  Christ  with  a  lighted  candle  before  it,  and  the  motto : 


22 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


“May  I  waste  so  I  show  the  face  of  Christ.”  “I  am 
crucified,  Christ  liveth  in  me.” 

Let  me  carry  you  on  to  the  second  secret.  The  cross 
is  the  secret  of  life  for  others  in  service.  Read  two  verses 
in  2  Corinthians  4:  “For  we  which  live  are  always  de¬ 
livered  unto  death  for  Jesus’  sake,  that  the  life  also  of 
Jesus  might  be  made  manifest  in  our  mortal  flesh.  So 
then  death  worketh  in  us,  but  life  in  you.”  Life  for  others 
only  as  death  works  in  us.  It  is  that  which  makes  work 
at  all,  and  which  makes  preaching  fruitful. 

One  of  the  first  principles  of  God  regarding  service 
seems  to  be  to  work  into  you  and  me  the  truth  which  he 
needs  us  to  proclaim  to  others.  Paul  knew  that.  It  began  in 
the  street  called  Straight  with  him,  it  deepened  and  devel¬ 
oped  in  the  solitudes  of  Arabia,  and  Paul  went  forth  know¬ 
ing  a  fellowship  with  Christ  in  his  death  that  perhaps  few 
have  ever  known,  but  that  you  and  I  would  need  to  know 
in  these  days  if  our  work  is  to  prove  fruitful  for  God 
and  for  others.  “Death  worketh  in  us,  but  life  in  you.” 

I  was  once  speaking  with  an  Egyptian  Christian  student, 
and  he  told  me  this,  that  when  the  priests  of  the  Coptic 
church  in  Egypt  are  ordaining  a  man  to  the  priesthood 
they  recite  over  him  the  prayers  that  they  recite  over  the 
dead,  inferring  that  he  is  dead  to  everything  of  the  world 
and  alive  only  to  God.  That  is  exactly  what  Paul  speaks 
of  here,  death  in  us,  life  for  others. 

You  know  the  substitutionary  power  of  the  cross.  You 
may  have  apprehended  your  death  position  in  Christ  so 
that  you  are  getting  victory  over  the  forms  of  the  self  life, 
but  you  and  I  need  to  enter  into  a  fellowship  with  Christ 
in  his  sufferings,  into  a  conformity  with  Christ  in  his  death, 
which  brings  into  us  the  spirit  of  the  cross,  the  spirit  of 
Calvary.  Death  requires  to  be  wrought  in  us  in  a  real 
death  fellowship  which  will  produce  life  that  ministers  to 
others. 

Paul  strikes  here  the  keynote  of  such  a  life,  “Always 
delivered  unto  death  for  Jesus’  sake.”  The  Greek  word 
means  “handed  over,”  always  handed  over,  as  the  Lord 


Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross 


23 


Jesus  Christ  was  handed  over,  as  the  Lord  handed  over 
himself ;  always  handed  over  to  death  for  Jesus’  sake. 
You  will  notice  that  it  is  we  who  live  who  are  to  be  handed 
over.  It  is  the  corn  of  wheat  that  has  to  die,  but  death 
means  the  gate  of  life,  the  gate  that  leads  into  a  richer, 
fuller,  abundant  life.  As  death  knocks  at  the  door  of  that 
corn  of  wheat  in  the  ground  it  breaks  open  the  hard  shell 
and  there  comes  out  of  it  what  we  see  above  the  ground. 
Just  in  the  same  way  as  the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
through  the  Holy  Spirit,  touches  in  us  everything  that  is 
against  God,  everything  that  belongs  to  the  old  creation, 
which  is  the  material  on  which  Satan  is  ever  working,  so 
that  work  of  the  cross  breaks  open  the  hard  shell  of  our 
nature  and  character  and  gives  an  outlet  for  the  life  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ.  Death  working  in  us,  life  works  in 
others. 

Are  you  and  I  willing  for  this?  Are  we  willing  to  let 
the  Holy  Spirit  hand  us  over  to  death  ?  Do  you  know  it  is 
as  true  of  me  as  it  is  of  Christ,  “No  man  taketh  my  life 
from  me.  I  have  power  to  lay  it  down”?  And  the 
question  is  to-day  whether  you  and  I  will  exercise  the 
power  that  we  have.  Are  we  willing  to  be  handed  over 
to  death,  whatever  that  may  mean  for  us,  in  order  that 
there  may  be  life  flowing  out  of  us  for  others  and  for  him 
who  gave  himself  for  us? 

What  will  it  mean?  What  will  it  mean,  if  we  allow 
the  work  of  the  cross  to  be  wrought  out  in  our  characters? 
It  may  mean  for  us  that  we  have  to  be  willing  to  be  set 
aside,  slighted,  put  in  the  background,  when  others  are 
being  put  forward ;  willing  to  be  misjudged  while  others 
are  praised;  willing  to  get  no  credit  in  our  work  while 
others  are  getting  much  credit.  For  some  it  might  mean 
to  be  willing  to  go  to  a  place  in  the  foreign  field  or  in 
some  land  that  is  being  shunned  by  others ;  willing  to 
tread  a  path  that  means  sacrifice ;  willing  to  receive  treat¬ 
ment  that  is  unpleasant,  but  receiving  it  in  a  Calvary 
spirit.  It  may  mean  no  longer  asking  God  to  deliver  from 
hard  circumstances,  but  asking  him  to  make  those  hard 


24 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


circumstances  the  instrument,  through  the  cross,  that  will 
break  open  the  hard  shell  of  your  nature  and  let  the  light 
of  Christ  flow  out. 

It  may  mean,  it  must  mean,  loving  every  one  with  a  love 
that  is  like  the  love  of  Christ  and  dealing  with  infinite 
patience  and  tenderness  with  every  member  of  the  Body  of 
Christ,  that  the  Body  of  Christ  may  grow  strong  and  ready 
for  the  coming  of  the  Lord. 

There  is  only  one  way  in  which  you  and  I  can  win  souls 
for  Christ ;  there  is  only  one  way  in  which  you  and  I  may 
have  a  fruitful  service  ;  it  is  the  way  of  sacrifice.  That  is 
the  only  way  in  which  the  life  of  Christ  can  be  made  mani¬ 
fest  and  flow  out  of  us  to  others. 

I  believe  this  age  is  rapidly  closing  up,  and  God  is  need¬ 
ing  men  and  women  filled  with  such  a  spirit  as  that,  the 
spirit  of  Christ,  the  spirit  of  the  cross,  the  spirit  of 
martyrs.  Are  we  willing?  Will  God  find  us  ready  and 
faithful  and  obedient?  What  will  be  the  result  if  we  are 
willing?  Life  for  others,  perhaps  revival  in  the  Church, 
the  ingathering  of  the  heathen,  the  gaining  again  for  many 
of  that  which  they  have  lost — the  vision  of  the  present 
Christ,  the  receiving  on  the  part  of  many  of  the  assurance 
of  things  that  are  essential ;  and  above  all,  glory  to  him 
who  was  handed  over  to  death  for  you  and  for  me. 

O  beloved  men  and  women,  to  make  others  see  him  and 
know  him,  and  believe  in  him  and  love  him,  and  follow 
him  and  go  after  him,  even  though  it  means  for  you  and 
for  me  travail  of  soul  and  death  to  self — “so  then  death 
worketh  in  us,  but  life  in  you.”  That  is  the  secret  of 
service  for  others,  and  the  cross  holds  the  secret. 

But  oh,  how  are  we  to  be  handed  over?  Not  one  of  us 
can  do  it,  but  will  you  turn  to  Hebrews  9 :14 :  “How  much 
more  shall  the  blood  of  Christ,  who  through  the  eternal 
Spirit  offered  himself  without  spot  to  God,  purge  your 
conscience  from  dead  works  to  serve  the  living  God”? 
The  same  power  by  which  Christ  handed  himself  over  to 
the  cross  is  the  power  by  which  you  and  I  can  hand  our¬ 
selves  over,  that  life  mav  be  for  others. 


Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross 


25 


Oh,  thank  God  for  it.  The  only  thing  that  God  needs 
is  a  willing  heart,  that  you  and  I  should  be  willing  to  tread 
the  path,  to  choose  the  life,  that  he  has  pictured  for  us  in 
his  Word.  And  then,  when  we  are  willing,  the  Holy  Ghost 
does  what  we  cannot  do,  he  takes  us  and  hands  over  us 
and  everything  in  us  that  is  against  God,  to  the  cross,  and 
the  moment  that  he  hands  that  over  to  the  cross,  the  door 
opens  and  the  life  of  Christ  finds  an  outlet,  the  pitcher  gets 
broken  and  the  light  is  seen,  the  light  shines  out. 

Fourth,  the  cross  makes  possible  the  gift  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  (Gal.  3:13,  14),  “Christ  hath  redeemed  us  from  the 
curse  of  the  law,  being  made  a  curse  for  us :  for  it  is 
written,  Cursed  is  every  one  that  hangeth  on  a  tree :  that 
the  blessing  of  Abraham  might  come  on  the  Gentiles 
through  Jesus  Christ ;  that  we  might  receive  the  promise 
of  the  Spirit  through  faith.”  The  cross  makes  possible 
the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  The  gift  of  the  Spirit  is  based 
upon  the  work  of  Christ  in  his  atoning  sacrifice.  Calvary 
and  Pentecost  are  inseparable.  Calvary  always  sends  a 
man  on  to  Pentecost ;  Pentecost  is  always  sending  a  man 
back  to  Calvary.  The  man  who  stops  at  Calvary  arrests 
the  plan  of  God.  That  is  to  say,  if  a  man  is  satisfied  with 
forgiveness  of  his  sins  and  wants  nothing  more,  he  has  an 
arrested  life  and  the  plan  of  God  has  come  to  a  stop ;  but 
the  man  who  stays  at  Pentecost  and  does  not  continually 
go  back  to  Calvary  is  defeating  the  purpose  of  God.  Cal¬ 
vary  and  Pentecost  are  always  working  into  each  other’s 
hands.  You  never  can  know  the  power  of  Pentecost  unless 
the  power  of  the  cross  is  working  in  you. 

One  of  the  saintliest  men  on  the  Keswick  platform  in 
the  olden  days  was  Charles  Fox,  and  Charles  Fox  used  to 
say,  “The  risen  life  somehow  or  other  always  gravitates 
back  to  the  cross.”  That  is  a  great  truth  for  us  to  learn. 
It  just  means  this,  that  the  finished  work  of  Christ  on  the 
cross  is  the  basis  on  which  the  Holy  Spirit  operates  to 
bring  to  fruition  the  great  purpose  of  God. 

I  know  that  the  believer  is  filled  with  the  Spirit  when  he 
first  receives  him,  but  only  to  the  extent  of  his  power  to 


26 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


receive,  and  his  capacity  at  that  moment  is  small,  very 
small.  It  can  only  be  enlarged  as  he  apprehends  the  great 
fact  of  the  death  of  Christ  and  yields  himself  to  the  Spirit 
of  God  for  the  purpose  of  that  death  to  be  worked  out  in 
him. 

Near  my  last  church  in  Scotland  was  a  little  village,  a 
favorite  summer  resort  that  jutted  out  into  an  arm  of  the 
North  Sea,  and  the  action  of  the  sea  was  continually  silting 
up  the  sand  at  the  mouth  of  the  river,  preventing  the  river 
from  doing  its  work.  Therefore  the  government  had  to 
be  continually  dredging  the  channel  so  as  to  let  the  river 
flow.  There  are  things  in  your  lives  and  in  mine  that  only 
the  cross  can  deal  with,  and  if  the  cross  is  not  allowed  to 
deal  with  those  things  and  touch  them  with  death,  why 
then  the  channel  of  our  lives  is  continually  getting  silted 
up  with  these  things  and  blocked.  Therefore  it  is  that 
the  Holy  Spirit  desires  to  use  the  cross  in  order  to  deepen 
the  channel  of  our  lives  and  so  have  the  opportunity  of 
filling  us  with  his  fulness. 

Calvary  and  Pentecost  are  inseparable  and  they  are  in¬ 
dispensable  for  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel.  Calvary 
creates  the  preacher  and  the  teacher,  and  Pentecost  equips 
the  preacher  and  the  teacher.  Big  learning  will  never  make 
us  preachers  or  teachers,  although  big  learning  has  its  place 
and  a  very  great  place;  but  there  is  one  theological 
seminary  into  which  we  must  go,  and  from  which  we  must 
graduate  if  we  are  to  be  preachers  and  teachers  of  the 
Gospel.  It  is  sometimes  called  Arabia,  and  Arabia  means 
for  you  some  place  where  you  come  face  to  face  with  the 
need  in  your  life  and  fight  it  out  in  the  presence  of  God. 
If  you  will  do  that  you  will  learn  what  Paul  learned  in  his 
Arabia,  you  will  learn  the  meaning  of  the  cross,  and  you 
will  learn  much  about  the  purpose  and  the  power  of  the 
Holy  Ghost,  for  Calvary  and  Pentecost  are  inseparable. 

We  may  stand  in  pulpits  and  we  may  teach  classes,  and 
we  may  organize  Christian  work,  and  people  may  praise 
us,  and  we  may  have  outward  success,  but  if  we  do  not 
know  Calvary  and  we  do  not  know  Pentecost  except  in  a 


Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross 


27 


superficial  manner,  those  people  we  speak  to  and  teach  will 
never  have  cause  to  glorify  God  in  us,  and  see  God  mighty 
in  and  through  us  as  they  saw  in  the  apostle  Paul. 

Let  me  say  another  thing,  a  fifth  fact.  The  cross  is  the 
source  of  all  victory,  and  there  is  a  fivefold  victory  for  the 
Christian  to  win.  First,  “But  thanks  be  to  God,  which 
giveth  us  the  victory  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,” 
victory  over  death  (1  Cor.  15:57).  Second,  “I  am  crucified 
with  Christ :  nevertheless  I  live;  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth 
in  me:  and  the  life  which  I  now  live  in  the  flesh  I  live  by 
the  faith  of  the  Son  of  God,  who  loved  me,  and  gave  him¬ 
self  for  me,”  victory  over  self  (Gal.  2:20).  Third,  “And 
they  that  are  Christ’s  have  crucified  the  flesh  with  the  af¬ 
fections  and  lusts,”  victory  over  the  flesh  (Gal.  5:24). 
Fourth,  “But  God  forbid  that  I  should  glory,  save  in  the 
cross  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  by  whom  the  world  is 
crucified  unto  me,  and  I  unto  the  world,”  victory  over  the 
world  (Gal.  6:14).  Fifth,  “And  having  spoiled  principal¬ 
ities  and  powers,  he  made  a  shew  of  them  openly,  triumph¬ 
ing  over  them  in  it,”  victory  over  Satan  (Col.  2 :15).  And 
Satan  can  be  defeated  on  no  ground  except  that  of  Calvary. 
There  on  the  cross  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  bruised  the  ser¬ 
pent’s  head  and  broke  the  serpent’s  power,  and  to-day  we 
stand  facing  a  conquered  foe.  Do  not  let  us  forget  it. 
The  cross  embraces  all  these  things,  and  gives  to  you  and 
to  me  a  full  and  complete  victory. 

I  do  not  think  we  should  ever  speak  of  the  tragedy  of 
the  cross.  There  was  no  tragedy  on  the  cross ;  that  was 
below  the  cross,  among  the  people  who  only  saw  in  the 
Son  of  God  some  one  whom  they  wanted  to  put  to  death. 
Do  not,  I  pray  you,  ever  speak  of  the  pathos  of  Christ’s 
death.  There  was  no  pathos  in  it,  there  was  victory,  glory. 
It  was  the  climax  of  his  life.  It  was  that  for  which  he  had 
come.  He  came  to  go  to  the  cross,  and  the  devil,  by  every 
possible  means  in  his  power,  tried  to  keep  him  from  the 
cross.  If  the  devil  can  keep  the  cross  from  you  and  you 
from  the  cross,  if  he  can  prevent  the  cross  from  working 
out  its  purpose  in  you  and  in  me,  if  he  can  make  us  shirk 


28 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


the  cross,  he  has  done  his  work,  he  needs  to  do  nothing 
more.  He  can  let  us  be  as  active  as  we  like  and  as  de¬ 
votional  as  we  like,  and  as  religious  as  we  please,  but  if 
he  can  keep  the  cross  out  of  our  lives  he  has  done  his  work. 
He  tried  to  do  it  with  Christ,  but  Christ  went  to  the  cross 
and  bruised  the  serpent’s  head,  and  on  the  ground  of  the 
victory  won  there  you  and  I  can  win  victory  here. 

The  sixth  fact  is  this :  the  cross  creates  the  obligation 
for  holiness  (1  Peter  1 :  15),  “But  as  he  which  hath  called 
you  is  holy,  so  be  ye  holy  in  all  manner  of  conversation.” 
You  will  find  that  the  command  in  that  verse  is  grounded 
upon  the  message  in  the  eighteenth  verse:  “Forasmuch  as 
ye  know  that  ye  were  not  redeemed  with  corruptible  things, 
as  silver  and  gold,  from  your  vain  conversation  received  by 
tradition  from  your  fathers ;  but  with  the  precious  blood 
of  Christ,” — because  Christ  died,  therefore  we  belong  to 
him  and  we  are  bound  in  honor  to  work  out  the  plan  of 
redemption,  if  we  stand  upon  the  redemption  position ;  but 
nothing  can  set  us  apart  for  God,  nothing  can  make  us 
holy,  except  as  the  cross  is  working  in  us,  because  the 
cross  alone  can  keep  the  hindrances  to  holiness  in  the 
place  of  death. 

Seventh,  the  cross  becomes  the  spring  of  Christian  seal 
(Titus  2:14),  “Who  gave  himself  for  us,  that  he  might 
redeem  us  from  all  iniquity,  and  purify  unto  himself  a 
peculiar  people,  zealous  of  good  works.”  It  becomes  the 
spring  of  Christian  zeal.  The  mark  of  the  crucified  life  is 
zeal  for  good  works.  I  think  there  is  never  an  idle  place 
in  the  sphere  of  the  cross-filled  and  cross-governed  life. 
You  will  note  what  Paul  says  leads  up  to  zeal ;  first,  re¬ 
demption,  then  the  readjustment  of  the  life  of  the  re¬ 
deemed.  The  aim  of  the  death  of  Christ  is  to  create  the 
Spirit  of  Christ  in  service,  “The  love  of  Christ  constrain- 
eth  me.”  It  lays  this  urge  upon  us  to  live  henceforth  unto 
him,  zealous  of  good  works.  But  let  me  just  say  this  one 
word  of  caution,  zeal  is  not  hot-headedness,  it  is  hot¬ 
heartedness.  True  zeal  always  acts  intelligently  and  wisely 
under  the  guidance  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Will  you  let  me 


Our  Indebtedness  to  the  Cross 


29 


say  this  to  you  very  humbly?  In  your  service  aim  at 
death. 

Oh,  the  weakness  of  so  much  of  our  evangelical  work 
to-day  is  its  superficiality.  We  clamor  for  results,  we 
strain  our  eyes  to  catch  some  sign,  and  when  we  get  the 
results  we  become  contented  with  results,  with  what  we 
see.  The  Church  judges  men  to-day  by  results,  and  what 
we  are  needing  to  do  is  to  aim  at  death  and  leave  results 
to  God.  Oh,  let  us  keep  in  touch  with  the  cross  and  hand 
over  our  zeal,  our  natural  impulsiveness  and  our  desire  to 
see  results,  to  the  cross,  in  order  that  we  may  have  only 
the  zeal  which  is  born  out  of  death  and  is  created  in  us  and 
through  us  by  the  Holy  Spirit.  Zeal  is  not  hot-headedness, 
it  is  hot-heartedness. 

I  think  Peter  would  say  to  you  and  to  me  to-day,  “Add 
to  your  zeal  knowledge,  and  to  knowledge  common-sense, 
and  to  common-sense  right  judgment,  and  to  right  judg¬ 
ment  patience  and  consideration  for  others,”  and  all  that 
grace  creates  especially  for  you  and  for.  me. 

At  your  leisure  read  2  Corinthians  6:1-10,  and  see  the 
character  of  the  worker  and  the  power  of  the  cross. 

My  last  point,  the  eighth,  is  this :  the  cross  gives  us  the 
assurance  of  immortality  (1  Thess.  5  :  10),  “who  died  for 
us,  that,  whether  we  wake  or  sleep,  we  should  live 
together  with  him.” 

So  the  cross  finds  us  where  we  are  by  nature  and  places 
us  where  we  shall  be  by  grace.  The  cross  begins  life  and 
the  cross  takes  us  into  the  life  that  is  forever. 

I  close  with  words  that  are  not  mine,  words  that  were 
written  by  one  of  the  old  mystic  poets  whose  poems  were 
so  full  of  the  teaching  of  the  cross : 

There,  as  knit  into  the  body 
Every  joint  and  limb, 

We,  his  ransomed,  his  beloved, 

We  are  one  with  Him. 

All  in  marvelous  completeness 
Added  to  the  Lord, 

There  to  be  his  crown  of  glory, 

His  supreme  reward. 


30 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


Wondrous  prize  of  our  high  calling ! 

Speed  we  on  to  this, 

Past  the  cities  of  the  angels 
Farther  into  bliss. 

On  into  the  depths  eternal 
Of  the  love  and  song, 

Where  in  God  the  Father’s  glory 
Christ  has  waited  long. 

There  to  find  that  none  beside  him 
God’s  delight  can  be, 

Not  beside  Him,  nay,  but  in  Him, 

O  beloved,  are  we. 

Prayer 

Our  Father,  we  beseech  Thee,  whatever  has  been  thy 
word  to  us,  that  no  one  seed  of  that  word  may  pass  from 
our  memories  or  be  taken  away  by  the  Wicked  One.  May 
nothing  be  forgotten  that  in  thy  purpose  we  should  remem¬ 
ber.  Let  thy  word  do  its  wondrous  work  in  each  one  of 
us,  that  so  this  may  be  the  result  of  our  redemption  here, 
<c  Death  working  in  us,”  death  to  everything  that  is  against 
thee,  (<Life  for  others,”  life  for  the  Church  and  glory  for 
him  who  loved  us  and  gave  himself  for  us. 

Now  unto  him  that  loved  us,  and  loosed  us  from  our 
sins  in  his  own  blood,  and  hath  made  us  kings  and  priests 
unto  God,  be  glory  and  dominion  forever,  Amen. 


Ill 

THE  MESSAGE  OF  THE  CROSS  IN  THE 
OLD  TESTAMENT 

THERE  seems  to  be  to-day  a  disposition  on  the  part 
of  many  to  emphasize  the  New  Testament  to  the 
neglect  of  the  Old  Testament,  and  almost  to  cut  out  the 
Old  Testament  as  having  no  practical  bearing  on  the  life  of 
the  present.  In  the  British  Navy  every  rope  has  in  it  a 
red  cord,  and  let  that  rope  be  cut  as  it  may  be,  and  be 
found  where  it  may  be,  the  little  red  cord  proclaims  it  to 
be  the  property  of  the  British  Navy.  God  has  a  scarlet 
thread  that  runs  from  Genesis  to  Revelation  uniting  those 
sixty-six  books  in  one  perfect  whole  and  preventing  any' 
separation  between  the  Old  and  the  New  Testaments,  and 
that  thread  is  the  sacrifice  of  his  Son  on  the  tree. 

Take  any  one  of  those  sixty-six  books  and  you  will  not 
fail  to  find  the  message  of  the  cross,  and  that  scarlet  thread 
not  only  proves  the  divine  authority  of  the  book,  but  it 
shows  the  necessity  for  these  two  books,  these  two  testa¬ 
ments  for  the  elucidation  and  the  interpretation  the  one 
of  the  other. 

The  more  you  read  the  Bible  the  more  you  will  see  that 
the  great  central  truth  of  it  is  Calvary.  It  is  the  founda¬ 
tion  of  God’s  plan  for  the  redemption  of  the  universe.  It 
is  the  ground  of  all  God’s  purpose  with  his  Church.  It  is 
the  cause  of  all  God’s  blessings  to  mankind. 

31 


32 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


As  an  illustration  of  the  message  of  the  cross  in  the 
Old  Testament,  I  confine  myself  to  the  writings  of  Moses, 
and  we  shall  find  in  the  Pentateuch  the  story  of  the  cross 
in  embryo.  All  that  the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
means,  and  that  takes  in  practically  the  whole  teaching 
of  the  New  Testament,  is  foreshadowed  in  these  first  five 
books  of  the  Bible.  Of  course  there  is  a  gradual  unfolding 
of  the  meaning  and  power  of  the  death  of  Christ  through 
History,  the  Psalms,  and  Prophecy  until  he  appears  who 
is  crucified  for  our  sins.  Paul  carries  the  revelation  a  step 
further  and  shows  us  in  Ephesians  1 :10  that  the  headship 
of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  over  the  universe  is  the  deliberate 
purpose  of  God,  and  in  Colossians  1 :20  that  Christ  on  the 
cross  is  the  point  of  reconciliation  between  God  and  those 
who  have  been  separated  from  him  by  sin;  and  so  the 
revelation  is  carried  on  until  finally,  in  Revelation  22 :2  we 
see  the  family  of  the  man  who  in  the  dawn  of  the  world’s 
history  was  driven  from  the  garden  gathered  again  around 
the  tree  of  life,  and  the  leaves  of  it  are  for  the  healing  of 
the  nations. 

In  the  Pentateuch  we  have  the  cross  in  germ.  It  was 
the  thought  in  God’s  mind  before  the  foundations  of  the 
world  were  laid,  in  order  to  answer  the  challenge  of  Satan 
and  to  meet  the  urgent  need  of  his  creatures  for  redemp¬ 
tion  ;  therefore  the  cross  and  what  it  stands  for  is  an  Old 
Testament  as  well  as  a  New  Testament  doctrine,  and  you 
cannot  read  the  roll-call  of  the  heroes  of  the  Christian 
faith  in  the  eleventh  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews 
without  seeing  that  if  was  the  power  of  the  cross  to  be, 
the  power  of  the  Lamb  to  come,  who  made  them  what  they 
were,  giants  of  faith  and  giants  of  patience. 

Let  us  look  at  the  first  book,  Genesis.  What  is  the  truth 
that  shines  out  in  the  book  of  Genesis  ?  It  is  just  this,  in  a 
few  words,  God  at  the  back  of  men  and  things ;  and  the 
keynote  of  Genesis  you  will  find  in  the  45th  chapter  and  the 
8th  verse,  and  four  words  in  that  verse,  “Not  you,  but 
God.” 

You  can  take  the  life  of  any  saint  mentioned  in  this 


The  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament 


33 


book,  and  opposite  his  faith  and  his  faithfulness,  his 
strength  and  his  obedience,  write  down  as  the  secret  of  it 
all  these  words,  “Not  you,  but  God.”  This  book  explains 
exactly  what  Calvary  proclaims,  the  mighty  working  of 
God  in  the  world  through  men  and  for  men  and  all  towards 
redemption.  As  the  source  of  all  his  dealings  with  the 
world,  hidden  in  itself,  and  yet  apparent  in  its  results, 
there  stands  the  cross,  and  we  see  in  the  foreshadowing 
of  the  cross  the  power  of  the  coming,  eternal  Son  of  God. 

The  ark  of  Noah  is  just  the  symbol  of  the  cross  which 
saves.  Noah  in  the  ark  is  just  the  type  of  the  New' Testa¬ 
ment  believer  in  Christ.  Abraham,  called  out  to  follow 
God,  is  just  the  picture  of  the  believer  who,  in  any  age, 
takes  up  the  cross  to  live  a  pilgrim  life  in  dependence' upon 
God.  The  offering  of  Isaac  on  Mount  Moriah  is  a  fore¬ 
shadowing  not  only  of  the  atoning  Saviour  but  of  the  in¬ 
spiration  which  the  cross  can  give  to  men  to  lead  a  life 
of  complete  sacrifice  at  the  command  of  God.  When 
Joseph  stood  before  his  brethren  with  the  memories  of 
wrongs  committed,  of  injustices  meted  out,  and  yet  with 
his  heart  full  of  forgiveness,  what  have  you  but  the  Old 
Testament  revelation  of  the  believer  indwelt  by  the  Spirit 
of  God,  and  the  Old  Testament  prediction  of  the  power  of 
the  Holy  Spirit  to  create  in  a  man  an  atmosphere  of  love, 
and  to  keep  in  the  place  of  death  every  desire  for  retalia¬ 
tion  and  revenge?  And  that  is  just  the  message  of  the 
cross  in  the  New  Testament. 

So,  broadly  speaking,  the  whole  message  of  Genesis  may 
just  be  said  to  be  this :  it  is  the  message  of  sacrifice  which 
procures  salvation,  and  forgiveness,  and  acceptance,  and 
forms  in  man  the  character  of  Christ ;  and  that  is  just  the 
message  of  the  New  Testament  cross  (Gal.  2:20)  “I  am 
crucified  with  Christ:  nevertheless  I  live;  yet  not  I,  but 
Christ  liveth  in  me.” 

Let  us  turn  to  the  book  of  Exodus.  What  is  the  message 
of  Exodus?  We  say  it  is  redemption,  that  it  is  God 
delivering  his  oppressed  people  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb 
and  leading  them  out  of  bondage.  The  keynote  of  Exodus 


34 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


we  usually  take  as  12:13,  '‘When  I  see  the  blood,  I  will 
pass  over  you,5’  but  I  think  that  the  book  of  Exodus  carries 
us  much  farther  than  that.  It  has  a  much  deeper  message 
than  that.  It  calls,  as  in  the  case  of  Moses,  for  a  full 
surrender  of  life  to  God  to  carry  out  the  will  of  God,  and 
it  shows  what  God  will  do  for  and  through  the  man  who 
holds  nothing  back  from  him.  I  scarcely  need  to  remind 
you  that  that  is  one  of  the  clearest  and  most  continuous 
messages  of  the  cross. 

The  verse  that  to  my  mind  seems  to  be  the  larger  mes-' 
sage  of  Exodus,  you  will  find  in  25  :8,  “And  let  them  make 
me  a  sanctuary ;  that  I  may  dwell  in  the  midst  of  it.”  The 
blood  which  redeems  us  from* sin  points  us  on  to  the  desire 
of  God  to  dwell  in  the  midst  of  us,  and  so  you  will  find 
that  a  large  part  of  this  book  is  taken  up  with  the  taber¬ 
nacle,  every  part  of  which  speaks  to  you  of  the  atoning 
sacrifice  of  our  Lord  and  of  the'  practical  outcome  in  the 
Christian  life  of  that  sacrifice. 

The  teaching  of  the  New  Testament  is  this:  the  cross 
not  only  saves  us  from  sin,  but  it  claims  for  God  what  it 
does  save  from  sin.  We  belong  to  God  as  his  temple.  The 
believer  is  God’s  sanctuary,  to  be  built  according  to  the 
pattern  showed  unto  us  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  in 
that  sanctuary  God  is  always  seeking  fellowship.  Have 
you  made  a  sanctuary  for  God  in  your  being?  Are  you 
careful,  in  these  days,  to  build  the  sanctuary  of  your  life 
according  to  the  pattern  shown  to  you  in  Christ  Jesus? 
God  is  desirous  of  having  fellowship  with  you  and  with 
me.  For  this  reason  you  will  never  know  a  real  exodus 
from  the  bondage  of  sin  except  as  that  fellowship  with  God 
becomes  real  and  full.  And  further,  only  as  the  heart 
becomes  the’  temple  of  God  through  the  Holy  Spirit  can 
the  life  of  any  one  of  us  be  furnished  with  the  gifts  as  the 
tabernacle  of  old  was  furnished,  so  that  the  fellowship 
becomes  a  source  of  power  and  of  blessing. 

O  beloved  friends,  the  great  purpose' of  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  to  keep  the  temple  clean  for  God,  to  work  into  those 
characters  of  ours  the  pattern  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 


The  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament 


35 


and  to  make  redemption  not  a  mere  escape  from  the  bond¬ 
age  of  sin,  but  a  means  of  creating  such  closeness  of 
fellowship  between  God  and  man  that  more  and  more  God 
will  be  able  to  possess  man,  and  man  more  and  more  will 
become  like  God.  That  God  is  hungry  for  the  fellowship 
of  his  people  is  the  proof  of  the  tabernacle  in  the  book  of 
Exodus,  “Let  them  make  me  a  sanctuary;  that  I  may 
dwell  among  them.” 

You  will  notice  that  the  meeting  place  for  the  fellowship 
which  God  is  longing  for  he  describes  in  verses  21  and  22, 
“And  thou  shalt  put  the  mercy  seat  above  upon  the  ark; 
and  in  the  ark  thou  shalt  put  the  testimony  that  I  shall 
give  thee.  And  there  I  will  meet  [by  appointment,  it  means] 
with  thee.”  Have  you  made* an  appointment  to  meet  with 
God  to-day?  “There  will  I  meet  [by  appointment]  with 
thee,  and  I  will  commune  with’ thee  from  above  the  mercy 
seat.”  That  was  the  meeting  place  in  the  old  dispensation. 
What  is  the  point  of  fellowship’in  this  dispensation  ?  The 
cross  of  Christ,  the  cross.  It  is  there  God  and  man  meet. 
There  God’s  heart  is  open  towards  man.  There  man’s 
heart  is  yielded  to  God.  “My  need  and  Thy  great  fulness 
met,  and  I  am  formed  in  Thee.”  That  is  the  message  of 
Exodus. 

Let  us  turn  to  Leviticus,  and  see  that  in  the  first  chapter 
and  the  first  verse  God  is  in  the  tabernacle  and  is  speaking 
to  the  people  from  the  place  of  indwelling.  Now  what  is 
the  message  of  Leviticus  ?  The  key  verse  is  usually  taken 
to  be  19:2,  “And  the  Lord  spake  unto  Moses,  saying. 
Speak  unto  all  the  congregation  of  the  children  of  Israel, 
and  say  unto  them,  Ye  shall  be  holy:  for  I  the  Lord  your 
God  am  holy.”  Now  join  with1  that  Leviticus  26 :12,  “And 
I  will  walk  among  you,  and  will  be  your  God,  and  ye  shall 
be  my  people.” 

Leviticus  claims  the  closest  connection  between  God  and 
his  redeemed  and  delivered  people.  But  what  is  God?  “I 
am  holy,”  God  says,  and  therefore  he  requires  a  holy 
people.  The  offerings  mentioned  in  the  first  seven  chapters 
of  this  book  speak  of  the  perfection  of  worship  which  ex- 


36 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


isted  between  God  and  his  divine  Son,  and  the  perfection 
of  worship  which  he  insists  shall  exist  between  himself  and 
his  human  sons. 

In  11 :45  you  will  get  the  link  between  Leviticus  and 
Exodus,  “For  I  am  the  Lord  that  bringeth  you  up  out  of 
the  land  of  Egypt,  to  be  your  God :  ye  shall  therefore  be 
holy,  for  I  am  holy.”  It  shows  that  the  aim  of  God  with 
his  people  was  not  the  mere  deliverance  of  them  from 
the  taskmasters  of  Egypt,  but  it  was  that  they  might  be¬ 
come  holy  so  that  he  should  be  able  to  walk  among  them 
and  be  their  God  and  call  them  his  people.  The  aim  of 
divine  deliverance  from  sin  is  holiness  of  life. 

All  the  teaching  of  the  New  Testament  proves  that  if 
God  is  to  be  at  the  back  of  things,  of  men,  as  Genesis 
shows,  is  to  indwell  the  believer  as  Exodus  reveals,  life 
must  be  impregnated  and  guided  by  the  Spirit  of  holiness, 
and  therefore  the  call  of  Leviticus,  just  as  it  is  the  call  of 
the  cross,  is  for  a  people  separated  unto  God,  separated 
from  everything  that  can  displease  him  and  hinder  the 
outworking  of  his  purpose  (2  Cor.  6:16).  “What  agree¬ 
ment  hath  the  temple  of  God  with  idols?  For  ye  are  the 
temple  of  the  living  God.”  And  Leviticus  reveals  this  to 
us,  that  there  are  two  factors  in  that  great  work  of  separa¬ 
tion — the  blood  and  the  oil. 

Now  the  distinct  command  of  God  in  Exodus  30:32  is, 
“Upon  man’s  flesh  shall  it  [the  oil]  not  be  poured.”  In 
Leviticus  8 :23  we  see  on  whom  the  oil  was  to  be  poured, 
upon  the  one  on  whose  hand  and  foot  and  ear  the  blood 
had  come.  What  is  the  teaching  of  the  New  Testament? 
It  is  very  important  to  notice  this.  The  Holy  Spirit  never 
separates  to  God  the  flesh,  he  never  separates  to  God  the 
old  man,  he  never  separates  to  God  the  uncrucified  soul. 
It  is  only  when  the  flesh,  the  old  man,  has  gone  to  the 
cross,  and  the  attitude  of  death  on  our  part  to  the  forms 
and  demands  of  the  self  life  is  taken  up  and  maintained, 
that  the  Holy  Spirit  can  fill  and  possess  and  sanctify  the 
believer. 


The  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament 


37 


That  is  the  message  of  the  cross  in  Romans  6 :6,  “ Know¬ 
ing  this,  that  our  old  man  is  crucified  with  him,  that  the 
body  of  sin  might  be  destroyed,  that  henceforth  we  should 
not  serve  sin.”  The  point  of  contact  for  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  the  cross,  and  if  you  and  I  ever  get  away  from  the  cross 
we  get  away  from  the  Holy  Spirit. 

Now  let  us  turn  to  Numbers.  What  is  the  teaching  of 
the  book  of  Numbers  ?  Many  people  say  it  is  a  dry  book, 
but  the  message  of  Numbers  is  just  the  most  practical 
meaning  of  the  cross,  and  it  is  this,  that  the  life  which  has 
been  redeemed  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  and  is  indwelt  by 
God,  called  into  fellowship  with  God,  can  never  be  an  idle 
life.  As  you  read  this  book  of  Numbers  you  will  see  that 
there  were  three  things  which  God  required  of  his  people 
in  those  days.  First,  activity;  second,  arrangement;  third, 
aggressiveness.  And  the  key  verse  of  Numbers,  we  may 
take  as  1 :54,  “And  the  children  of  Israel  did  according 
to  all  that  the  Lord  commanded  Moses,  so  did  they.” 

At  the  source  of  all  life  of  Israel,  God’s  demand  was 
for  explicit  obedience,  and  God’s  expectation  was  that, 
that  obedience  would  be  granted.  If  there  is  any  virtue 
which  the  cross  requires  for  the  full  outworking  of  the 
purpose  of  redemption  on  the  part  of  the  believer,  it  is 
obedience.  The  Calvary  chapter  of  this  book  (and  you 
will  find  that  each  one  of  these  books  contain  Calvary 
chapters — Genesis  3,  Exodus  12,  Leviticus  16  and  Num¬ 
bers  21),  shows  us  that  disobedience  is  absolutely  fatal. 

Let  us  look  for  a  moment  at  those  three  things  that  God 
required  of  his  people,  and  see  how  they  link  us  on  to  the 
New  Testament  teaching.  The  first  thing  he  required 
was  activity.  It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  say  that  that  is 
bound  up  with  a  living  Christianity.  A  dead  faith  is 
always  a  do  nothing  faith ;  but  the  Christian  life  is  full  of 
potency,  force,  passion,  enthusiasm  for  Christ,  and  there¬ 
fore  for  the  needs  of  the  world.  These  are  some  of  the 
powers  which  drive  on  Christian  life  in  service,  and  at 
the  back  of  each  one  of  them,  as  its  inspiration,  is  the 
sacrifice  of  the  altar  of  God  who  went  to  the  cross. 


38 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


Then,  will  you  take  the  second  thing  God  required  of 
his  people,  which  was  arrangement?  One  of  the  chief 
facts  of  the  book  of  Numbers  is  the  importance  and  value 
of  details  for  their  march,  their  work,  their  worship. 
Think  of  the  practical  teaching  of  the  cross  in  the  New 
Testament.  Take  for  instance,  1  Corinthians  12,  and  you 
will  see  that  the  same  close  attention  is  insisted  upon  by 
the  cross  in  all  the  details  of  Christian  life  and  work. 
God  leaves  nothing  to  chance.  Each  one  of  us  is  called 
to  take  his  right  place  and  do  his  or  her  bit  of  work,  and 
the  only  way  in  which  the  Body  of  Christ  can  be  developed 
and  made  strong  and  fit  for  her  purpose  is  by  each 
member  of  the  Body  of  Christ  falling  into  the  right  place 
and  doing  the  God-revealed  bit  of  work.  I  want  to  say 
this,  especially  to  those  who  are  in  Christian  service :  your 
attention  or  inattention  to  details  in  your  work  will  make 
or  mar  your  work.  It  will  either  solve  your  difficulties  or 
increase  them.  Remember,  everything  counts  in  the 
service  of  God,  because  everything  means  something.  And 
the  cross  puts  this  demand  upon  every  child  of  God  in 
regard  to  service,  that  we  shall  be  honest  and  honorable 
even  in  the  smallest  bit  of  work  that  we  have  to  do.  I 
want  to  emphasize  that.  The  demand  of  the  cross  is  that 
we  shall  be  honorable  and  honest  and  straight  in  every 
bit  of  work  that  we  are  asked  to  do,  although  it  be  just 
the  most  trivial  bit  of  service  that  has  to  be  done.  It  has 
its  place  in  God’s  work,  and  every  bit  of  God’s  work 
requires  to  be  rightly  accomplished. 

Now  take  the  other  thing  that  God  required  of  the  Jew 
and  of  Israel  in  those  days,  and  you  will  find  aggressive¬ 
ness.  Look  at  the  first  chapter  of  Numbers  and  see  how 
it  opens  with  the  call  to  battle.  There  is  a  sentence  that 
rings  through  that  chapter,  I  think  it  occurs  thirty  times, 
“Able  to  go  forth  to  war,”  “Able  to  go  forth  to  war.” 
What  is  the  message  of  the  cross?  It  is  a  call  to  arms, 
and  never  did  that  call  sound  more  loudly  in  the  ears  of 
God’s  people  than  it  sounds  to-day.  For  we  are  in  the 
fight  to-day  as  perhaps  we  have  never  before  been. 


The  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament 


39 


I  was  preaching  in  one  of  the  most  interesting  of  mission 
halls  in  New  York,  the  Jerry  McAuley  Mission,  and  I 
picked  up  a  magazine,  when  I  was  sitting  on  the  platform, 
and,  turning  over  a  leaf,  I  caught  these  words :  “The 
war  of  Satan  against  God.”  I  said  to  myself,  “That  man 
knows  something,  whoever  he  is.  He  has  the  right  idea 
of  the  situation.”  For  that  is  the  truth  of  the  situation 
to-day,  we  are  in  a  fight.  Are  you  all  in  the  fight  ?  I  find 
there  are  a  great  many  Christian  people  who  do  not  know 
there  is  a  fight  on,  and  they  are  taking  it  easy,  and  the 
call  of  the  cross  is  a  call  to  arms  for  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ. 

Read  the  Epistle  to  the  Ephesians,  and  what  do  you 
see?  It  is  an  epistle  of  warfare  that  leads  to  victory  and 
rest.  We  are,  together  with  the  believers  in  the  Epistle 
to  the  Ephesians,  seated  with  Christ  in  heavenly  places. 
What  is  that  ?  A  challenge  to  Satan  that  he  will  not  shirk. 
The  whole  purpose  of  the  devil  is  to  get  you  down  from 
that  pinnacle,  not  positionally,  of  course,  but  practically, 
and  when  he  gets  you  down  from  that  position  he  will 
defeat  you. 

We  are  seated  in  heavenly  places,  and  so  Paul  goes  on 
to  describe,  in  that  sixth  chapter,  the  great  conflict  into 
which  every  Christian  is  summoned.  And  what  do  you 
find?  That  the  cross  is  not  only  that  which  calls  you  to 
fight,  but  is  the  ground  on  which  you  stand  in  order  to 
fight.  Do  not  let  us  forget  that.  The  only  way  in  which 
we  can  fight  the  devil  to-day  is  by  the  cross,  and  as  you 
stand  at  the  cross,  and  as  you  claim  the  victory  of  Calvary 
against  him  and  all  his  works  and  wiles  you  will  find  that 
Calvary  spells  Victory. 

Here  in  Numbers  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  revealed,  in 
24:17,  as  the  scepter  who  shall  rise  out  of  Israel  and  shall 
smite  the  corners  of  Moab  and  destroy  all  the  children  of 
Seth,  and  in  the  New  Testament  you  have  him  revealed 
as  the  Victor,  and  the  victory  won  by  him  on  the  cross 
makes  sure  the  victory  won  here. 

There  are  two  things  in  this  book  of  Numbers  which 


40 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


speak  of  Calvary.  There  is  the  sixth  chapter,  where,  in 
the  separation  of  the  Nazarite,  we  see  the  condition  of 
life  to  which  the  cross  calls  as  essential  for  true  Christian 
life  and  service.  Then  in  the  sixteenth  chapter  you  have 
the  sin  of  Korah,  and  in  that  we  need  to  be  very  wide 
awake,  to-day,  because  it  is  at  work.  What  is  it?  What 
was  the  sin  of  Korah?  The  intrusion  into  the  office  of 
the  priesthood  of  an  unholy  man  and  unholy  fire — counter¬ 
feit  holiness  and  counterfeit  power. 

To-day  the  air  is  vibrating  with  the  doctrines  of  demons 
and  the  spirits  of  evil  are  at  work  everywhere,  and  only  by 
the  cross  can  you  meet  them,  and  only  by  the  cross  can 
you  find  out  the  truth  about  these  doctrines.  I  beseech' 
you,  test  every  writing  of  man  to-day  by  the  atoning  sac¬ 
rifice  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  That  is  the  touchstone. 
You  will  see  it  in  its  true  light.  You  will  come  to  know 
this  and  thank  God  for  it  that  the  cross  is  your  instru¬ 
ment  of  defense  against  the  wiles  of  the  devil  and  your 
instrument  of  offence  against  the  powers  of  darkness. 

We  come  to  Deuteronomy,  and  what  is  the  message  of 
Deuteronomy?  Verse  30:19  says  (and  there  is  one  word 
in  it  that  sums  up  the  whole  book),  “I  call  heaven  and 
earth  to  record  this  day  against  you,  that  I  have  set  before 
you  life  and  death,  blessing  and  cursing ;  therefore  choose 
life,  that  both  thou  and  thy  seed  may  live.”  The  message 
of  Deuteronomy  is  that  word  “choose.”  That  is  the  great 
word  of  the  book,  “choose,”  with  all  its  forms. 

Moses  has  been  telling  the  people  of  Israel  of  God’s 
choice  of  them  and  all  that  it  means,  and  then,  as  he  comes 
to  the  end  of  his  witness  to  the  faithfulness  and  love  of 
God,  his  message  to  his  people  is,  “Now  you  choose.  Two 
paths  are  open  to  you,  and  it  is  your  will  that  has  to 
decide.”  In  the  Christian  life  and  work  the  teaching  of 
the  Holy  Spirit  is  that  the  great  decisive  factor  in  the 
conflict  is  our  will.  You  can  see  how  that  is  emphasized 
in  the  New  Testament.  How  often  you  come  across  some¬ 
thing  like  this :  “Yield  yourself  unto  God.  Present  your 
body  unto  God.  Glorify  God  in  your  body  and  in  your 


The  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament 


41 


spirit,”  all  showing  that  these  are  the  actions  of  your  will, 
deliberately  faced  and  deliberately  done.  Your  will  and 
mine  are  only  safe  when  they  are  in  co-operation  with 
the  Holy  Spirit. 

Now  will  you  notice  this:  When  God  asks  the  sur¬ 
render  of  our  will  it  does  not  mean  that  we  drop  our  will. 
Dropping  one’s  will  always  engenders  passivity,  passivity 
of  mind,  passivity  of  spirit,  passivity  of  will ;  and  that  is 
one  of  the  great  perils  of  these  days.  The  dropping  of 
the  will  is  the  essential  condition  for  Satanic  working. 
Passivity  of  the  will,  the  mind,  the  spirit  is  an  essential 
condition  for  Satanic  working.  If  a  man  is  to  go  in  for 
spiritism  to-day  he  simply  drops  everything  and  becomes 
an  empty  machine  into  which  the  spirits  of  evil  rush  and 
take  possession  of  him.  Satan  with  all  his  marvelous 
ingenuity  gets  alongside,  and  is  getting  alongside,  of 
Christian  people  to-day  and  playing  upon  their  very 
desire  to  be  true  to  God,  and  he  is  saying  to  them,  “You 
know  if  you  are  to  reach  that  life  of  holiness  you  musf 
drop  your  will.”  The  result  of  dropping  the  will  is  that 
Christians  are  becoming  afflicted  with  the  awful  disease 
of  passivity,  and  you  find  it  everywhere. 

People  come  to  my  wife  and  to  myself  and  say,  “You 
know  that  is  just  how  we  are.  We  do  not  seem  to  be  able 
to  pray,  we  do  not  seem  to  be  able  to  do  anything  to-day. 
We  are  being  driven  up  into  a  corner,  being  hedged 
around,  and  there  is  nothing  in  us.”  There  is  nothing 
more  perilous  in  these  awful  days  than  getting  into  this 
condition  of  passivity  of  mind  and  will  and  spirit.  Satan 
requires  the  absolute  consent  and  surrender  of  a  man’s 
will  in  order  to  do  his  work.  Notice  that  God  requires 
the  same  thing,  the  absolute  surrender  of  your  will  and 
life,  but  not  to  become  passive,  to  become  active.  That 
is  where  the  difference  comes  in.  Satan  causes  their 
passivity,  God  demands  activity  of  your  will,  activity  of 
your  spirit,  activity  of  your  life  in  co-operation  with  the 
Holy  Spirit. 

When  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  was  in  the  Garden  of 


42 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


Gethsemane  he  was  completely  master  of  his  own  will, 
so  that  he  was  able  to  say,  “Thy  will  be  done.”  He  put 
his  will  alongside  of  the  Father's  will,  and  entered  into 
co-operation  with  his  Father  for  the  purpose  of  carrying 
out  those  great  divine  tasks.  And  co-operation  with  the 
Holy  Spirit  always  entails  watchfulness,  perfect  obedience, 
prayerfulness,  and  the  use  of  all  God-provided  means. 

I  do  pray  you  to  remember  this,  that  the  Holy  Spirit 
always  makes  us  intelligent.  He  never  makes  us  foolish 
or  fanciful.  He  never  leads  us  to  take  false  steps.  He 
never  carries  us  into  the  region  of  fiction.  That  is  what 
the  devil  is  doing  to-day  with  multitudes  of  people,  but 
the  Holy  Spirit  always  works  along  the  line  of  intelligence 
The  thing  he  wants  to  do  with  Christian  people  to-day  is 
to  make  them  sane  and  well  balanced. 

I  do  not  need  to>  tell  you  that  that  is  one  of  the  things 
we  are  requiring  to  look  for  very  much,  that  we  keep  well 
balanced  in  relation  to  truth  and  in  relation  to  everything 
else.  The  Holy  Spirit  does  that.  And  how  are  we  to 
co-operate?  How  is  this  co-operation  brought  about? 
Just  as  the  Holy  Spirit  works  in  the  purpose  of  the  cross 
to  our  lives.  He  never  works  apart  from  the  cross.  What 
does  the  cross  do  ?  It  is  meant  to  touch  with  death  every 
force  in  you  and  me  which  is  evil  and  natural,  that  belongs 
to  the  old  nature  and  that  is  constantly  at  work  asserting 
its  supremacy  over  the  supremacy  of  Jesus  Christ,  and 
therefore  hindering  the  Holy  Spirit  from  doing  his  work. 
That  is  why  Calvary  always  sends  us  to  Pentecost,  and 
Pentecost  always  sends  us  back  to  Calvary. 

We  never  can  get  away  from  the  cross.  The  moment 
you  get  away  from  the  cross  your  feet  are  on  slippery 
places,  and  as  the  Holy  Spirit  works  in  the  death  purpose 
of  the  cross  he  works  in,  as  well,  the  life  purpose.  And 
so  we  reckon  ourselves  dead  to  sin  and  alive  unto  God. 

Now  here  is  the  message  of  the  Pentateuch  in  a  few 
sentences :  Genesis,  God  at  the  back  of  everything  work¬ 
ing  up  to  full  redemption.  Exodus,  God  delivering  from 
sin — not  as  the  final  goal,  but  to  call  the  delivered  ones  to 


The  Cross  in  the  Old  Testament 


43 


surrender,  that  they  may  do  his  work  and  that  he  may 
tabernacle  among  them.  Leviticus,  God  revealing  the 
awfulness  of  sin  and  calling  for  a  separated  people. 
Numbers,  God  requiring  on  the  part  of  his  people  constant 
activity,  arrangement,  and  aggressiveness.  Deuteronomy, 
God  emphasizing  the  power  of  the  human  will  in  life 
and  service  in  co-operation  with  the  Spirit  of  God. 

Now  that  is  the  message  of  the  cross  in  the  New  Testa¬ 
ment,  God  in  everything;  God  in  us  seeking  us  for  him¬ 
self  absolutely,  calling  us  into  a  real  conflict  and  a  real 
qonquest,  with  the  intelligent  use  of  our  powers  and  the 
co-operation  of  our  wills  with  the  Holy  Spirit,  to  reach 
out  to  the  utmost  ends  of  the  earth  and  do  our  best  for 
him. 

These  things  do  not  happen  by  accident.  These  things 
are  not  in  the  Word  of  God  by  accident.  They  are  there 
to  show  you  and  me  this :  that  the  God  in  the  Gospels  is 
the  God  of  the  Pentateuch,  the  same  God.  A  man  cannot 
get  rid  of  the  Pentateuch  any  more  than  he  can  get  rid  of 
the  Gospels.  The  cross  fills  the  one  book  as  it  fills  the 
other.  The  cross  is  revealed  in  the  one  Testament  as  it  is 
revealed  in  the  other.  Moses  saw  the  day  of  Christ  afar 
off  and  was  glad,  and  he  was  willing  to  bear  the  reproach 
of  Christ  rather  than  go  after  the  riches  of  Egypt.  And 
Christ  looked  back  to  the  day  of  Moses  and  stamped  his 
writings  with  his  divine  authority. 

Right  through  the  Bible  from  Genesis  to  Revelation  runs 
the  scarlet  thread  of  the  cross,  proving  that  the  book  has 
come  from  God,  and  that  the  message  of  the  whole  book 
is  one — Christ  Saviour,  Lord,  and  Coming  King ;  proving 
as  well  that  the  cross  is  the  foundation  of  God’s  plan  for 
the  work  of  redemption.  It  is  the  power  by  which  God 
redeems  the  universe,  brings  men  back  to  himself,  develops 
in  them  a  Christ-like  character,  meets  the  needs  of  their 
spirit,  soul  and  body,  and  it  is  the  power  by  which,  at  last, 
he  will  seat  his  Son  upon  the  throne  of  the  universe. 

You  and  I  need  not  be  surprised  at  Satan’s  persistent 
desire  to  get  rid  of  the  Pentateuch  and  to  get  rid  of  the 


44 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


atoning  sacrifice  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  I  expect  to 
see  much  more  vicious  attacks  upon  the  citadel  of  Christian 
faith,  Jesus  Christ’s  person  and  work,  than  we  have  yet 
seen.  But  the  man  who  will  stand  by  the  cross  and  let 
the  purpose  of  the  cross  be  wrought  out  in  him  will  stand 
the  storm  and  find  his  faith  resting  on  a  foundation  which 
will  never  move  from  under  him. 

“Go  to  the  deeps  of  God’s  promise; 

And  know  of  His  wonderful  might; 

Whatever  would  be  a  true  blessing, 

For  Jesus’  sake  comes  as  thy  right. 

“Go  to  the  deeps  of  God’s  promise ; 

And  claim  whatsoever  ye  will; 

The  Blessing  of  God  will  not  fail  thee, 

His  word  He  will  surely  fulfill.” 

Prayer 

0  God,  wilt  Thou  continue  thy  blessing  with  us,  and 
may  we  be  such  a  separated  people  that  it  will  be  possible 
for  Thee  to  walk  among  us  and  call  us  thy  people.  In 
Jesus’  Name,  Amen. 


IV 


THE  CROSS  IN  THE  GOSPELS 
STUDY  of  the  Gospels  will  help  us  to  understand 


11  the  divine  view  of  the  cross,  and  it  will  be  seen  what 
the  cross  is  in  the  eye  of  God,  what  place  it  has  in  the  plan 
of  God,  what  mighty  purpose  God  has  to  work  through 
it  in  the  lives  of  his  people. 

First  of  all,  I  would  ask  you  to  think  of  the  witness  of 
the  Holy  Spirit  to  the  purpose  of  the  coming  of  Christ.  I 
have  many  passages  to  ask  you  to  note,  which  perhaps  you 
will  look  at  in  your  leisure  hours.  Before  our  Lord’s 
birth,  through  the  angels,  you  have  the  witness  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  (Matt.  1 :20,  21).  “But  while  he  thought  on  these 
things,  behold,  the  angel  of  the  Lord  appeared  unto  him 
[Joseph]  in  a  dream,  saying,  Joseph,  thou  son  of  David, 
fear  not  to  take  unto  thee  Mary  thy  wife:  for  that  which 
is  conceived  in  her  is  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  And  she  shall 
bring  forth  a  son,  and  thou  shalt  call  his  name  Jesus: 
for  he  shall  save  his  people  from  their  sins.”  Also  (Luke 
1 :30-33),  “And  the  angel  said  unto  her,  Fear  not,  Mary: 
for  thou  hast  found  favour  with  God.  And,  behold,  thou 
shalt  conceive  in  thy  womb,  and  bring  forth  a  son,  and 
shalt  call  his  name  Jesus.  He  shall  be  great,  and  shall 
be  called  the  Son  of  the  Highest :  and  the  Lord  God  shall 
give  unto  him  the  throne  of  his  father  David :  And  he  shall 
reign  over  the  house  of  Jacob  for  ever ;  and  of  his  kingdom 
there  shall  be  no  end.” 


45 


46 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


That  was  the  fulfillment  of  the  promise  given  hundreds 
of  years  before,  you  will  remember,  to  David  in  2  Samuel 
7:16-19.  Gabriel  confirmed  the  promise  given  to  David, 
to  Mary,  with  regard  to  the  coming  of  Christ. 

Second,  the  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit  before  His  birth 
through  Zacharias  (Luke  1:67).  “And  his  father  Zach- 
arias  was  filled  with  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  prophesied, 
saying,  And  thou,  child,  shalt  be  called  the  prophet  of  the 
Highest;  for  thou  shalt  go  before  the  face  of  the  Lord 
to  prepare  his  ways ;  to  give  knowledge  of  salvation  unto 
his  people  by  the  remission  of  their  sins,  through  the  tender 
mercy  of  our  God ;  whereby  the  dayspring  from  on  high 
hath  visited  us,  to  give  light  to  them  that  sit  in  darkness 
and  in  the  shadow  of  death,  to  guide  our  feet  into  the  way 
of  peace”  (vs.  76-79). 

That  is  the  prophecy  of  Zacharias  through  the  Holy 
Spirit,  regarding  the  birth  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  I  want  you 
to  notice  in  passing  the  beauty  of  the  words  which  the  Holy 
Spirit  uses,  “The  dayspring  from  on  high.”  The  Greek 
word  means  “rising  of  light,”  the  dawn,  and  the  word 
day  spring  is  found  only  here  and  in  Job  38:12,  where,  in 
the  Hebrew,  it  also  means  to  dawn.  It  means  to  be  up 
early  at  the  task;  it  means  therefore,  earnestly,  passion¬ 
ately,  with  strong  earnestness  for  the  accomplishment  of  a 
purpose.  That  was  true  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  the 
dayspring,  the  One  who  has  been  up  early  at  the  task. 
Now  what  is  the  task?  “The  dayspring  from  on  high 
hath  visited  us.”  The  Greek  word  for  that  means  to 
inspect  and  then  to  relieve.  The  Holy  Spirit  never  uses  a 
wrong  word  or  an  unnecessary  word,  but  always  just  the 
word  which  most  clearly  expresses  the  divine  purpose. 
And  here  is  the  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit  to  the  coming 
of  one  who  would  be  up  early  at  his  work,  and  his  work 
was  to  inspect  God’s  people,  inspect  the  human  race,  and 
then  relieve  them.  And  is  this  not  the  meaning  of  the 
coming  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ? 

Third,  at  his  birth,  through  the  angels  (Luke  2 :10,  11). 
“And  the  angel  said  unto  them,  Fear  not:  for,  behold,  I 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


4  7 


bring  you  good  tidings  of  great  joy,  which  shall  be  to  all 
people.  For  unto  you  is  born  this  day  in  the  city  of 
David  a  Saviour,  which  is  Christ  the  Lord.” 

Fourth,  through  the  Baptist  (John  1 :29,  34,  36).  “The 
next  day  John  seeth  Jesus  coming  unto  him,  and  saith, 
Behold  the  Lamb  of  God,  which  taketh  away  the  sin  of 
the  world.  And  I  saw,  and  bare  record  that  this  is  the 
Son  of  God.  And  looking  upon  Jesus  as  he  walked,  he 
saith.  Behold  the  Lamb  of  God !” 

Fifth,  at  the  resurrection,  through  the  young  man  at  the 
tomb  (Mark  16:6).  “And  he  saith  unto  them,  Be  not 
affrighted:  Ye  seek  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  which  was  cruci¬ 
fied:  he  is  risen;  he  is  not  here:  behold  the  place  where 
they  laid  him.” 

Sixth,  at  the  ascension,  through  the  two  men  sent 
especially  from  heaven  (Acts  1:11),  where  they  called  the 
attention  of  the  wondering  disciples  to  the  fact  that  this 
same  Jesus,  the  One  whom  they  had  known,  the  One 
whom  they  had  seen  with  the  marks  of  the  cross  upon 
Him,  would  “so  come.” 

So  that  is  the  witness  of  the  Holy  Spirit  to  the  purpose 
of  the  coming  of  Christ. 

Second,  I  want  you  to  notice  Christ’s  own  vision  of  his 
mission.  The  cross  sheds  light  upon  that  in  the  very 
words  of  Christ.  Here  are  a  number  of  passages :  “I  am 
not  come  to  call  the  righteous,  but  sinners  to  repentance” 
(Matt.  9:13).  “For  as  Jonas  was  three  days  and  three 
nights  in  the  whale’s  belly ;  so  shall  the  Son  of  man  be 
three  days  and  three  nights  in  the  heart  of  the  earth” 
(Matt.  12:40);  “From  that  time  forth  began  Jesus  to 
show  unto  his  disciples,  how  that  he  must  go  unto  Jeru¬ 
salem,  and  suffer  many  things  of  the  elders  and  chief 
priests  and  scribes,  and  be  killed,  and  be  raised  again  the 
third  day”  (Matt.  16:21);  “And  while  they  abode  in 
Galilee,  Jesus  said  unto  them,  The  Son  of  man  shall  be 
betrayed  into  the  hands  of  men :  and  they  shall  kill  him, 
and  the  third  day  he  shall  be  raised  again”  (Matt.  17:22, 
23)  ;  “And  Jesus  going  up  to  Jerusalem  took  the  twelve 


48 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


disciples  apart  in  the  way,  and  said  unto  them,  Behold,  we 
go  up  to  Jerusalem,  and  the  Son  of  man  shall  be  betrayed 
unto  the  chief  priests  and  unto  the  scribes,  and  they  shall 
condemn  him  to  death,  and  shall  deliver  him  to  the  Gentiles 
to  mock,  and  to  scourge,  and  to  crucify  him:  and  the 
third  day  he  shall  rise  again”  (Matt.  20:17-19)  ;  “Ye  know 
that  after  two  days  is  the  feast  of  the  passover,  and  the 
Son  of  man  is  betrayed  to  be  crucified”  (Matt.  26:2); 
“For  the  Son  of  man  is  come  to  seek  and  to  save  that 
which  was  lost”  (Luke  19:10)  ;  “And  as  Moses  lifted  up 
the  serpent  in  the  wilderness,  even  so  must  the  Son  of 
man  be  lifted  up”  (John  3:14-21);  “No  man  taketh  it 
from  me,  but  I  lay  it  down  of  myself”  (John  10:18). 

All  these  words  from  the  lips  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
were  simply  the  fulfillment  of  prophecy.  I  want  you  to 
turn  for  an  illustration  to  the  22nd  Psalm,  written  by 
David,  and  David  expresses  here  some  tremendous  grief 
of  his  own  life,  and  you  cannot  read  without  hearing  the 
sob  of  a  broken  heart,  David’s  broken  heart,  sobbing  out 
the  great  grief  through  which  he  was  passing.  But  in 
sobbing  out  the  grief  for  his  own  experience,  he  was  sob¬ 
bing  out  prophetically  the  deeper  grief  of  the  greater 
heart  that  also  was  to  break,  and  as  our  Lord  hung  upon 
that  cross  he  began  this  sob:  “My  God,  my  God,  why 
hast  Thou  left  me  destitute?” 

I  want  you  to  notice  this  verse  where  He  says,  “I  am 
a  worm.”  The  literal  meaning  of  the  word  is  maggot, 
“I  am  a  maggot,  and  no  man ;  a  reproach  of  men,  and 
despised  of  the  people.”  It  was  that  maggot  that  had  to 
be  killed  in  order  to  give  the  scarlet  color  with  which  the 
curtains  of  the  tabernacle  were  dyed.  Our  Lord  is  liken¬ 
ing  himself,  in  his  hour  of  death,  to  that,  and  there  in  his 
death  our  sins  have  been  dealt  with.  The  Lord  had  to 
die  in  ordei^  to  make  it  possible  for  us  to  be  washed 
whiter  than  snow,  just  as  that  maggot  had  to  die  in  order 
that  those  curtains  of  the  tabernacle  that  were  to  speak 
of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  should  receive  the  color  that  was 
there.  All  these  things  the  cross  speaks  of  in  the  Gospels 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


49 


are  just  a  fulfillment  of  those  Old  Testament  prophecies 
concerning  himself. 

You  will  notice  this  as  you  read  these  passages,  that  in 
Christ’s  own  thought  he  did  not  come  to  found  a  new 
religious  order,  although  his  disciples  are  called  “Christ 
ones,”  “Christians.”  He  did  not  come  as  a  propagandist 
with  a  new  ethical  code,  although  the  world’s  highest  and 
best  ethics  have  their  foundation  in  the  principles  laid 
down  by  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  Christ  came  as  a  Saviour 
from  sin.  He  came  to  die.  His  only  purpose  in  taking 
on  the  likeness  of  human  flesh,  of  human  nature,  was  that 
he  might  die,  and  through  his  death  bring  about  the  great 
purpose  that  God  the  Father  had  in  His  heart  in  relation 
to  the  world.  And  that  death  has  effected  a  victory  which 
cannot  be  limited.  The  work  of  Christ  on  the  cross  has 
brought  about  the  experience  of  a  marvelous  victory  which 
can  have  no  limits  put  to  it. 

Think  of  it  for  a  moment.  It  means  victory  for  God  in 
the  vindication  of  his  character,  victory  for  himself  in  the 
great  act  of  self-abasement  and  self-surrender;  victory 
for  the  human  race  in  the  fullest  possible  redemption ; 
victory  for  the  earth  in  the  cleansing  of  it  and  in  the 
deliverance  of  it  from  the  curse  pronounced  on  it  at  the 
fall;  victory  for  the  animal  creation  in  its  perfect  freedom 
from  brutal  passions ;  victory  for  the  heavens  in  the  clear¬ 
ing  out  of  all  the  hosts  of  evil  spirits  and  the  sending  of 
them  into  the  abyss ;  victory  over  Satan  in  the  dislodgment 
of  him  from  heaven,  in  the  dislodgment  of  him  from  the 
heavenly  places  where  he  is  to-day ;  in  the  dislodgment  of 
him  from  the  earth  hereafter;  in  the  dislodgment  of  him 
from  the  abyss  into  the  lake  of  fire;  and  victory  for  the 
whole  universe  of  God  when  the  dominion  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  shall  stretch  from  shore  to  shore. 

And  that  is  only  a  very  small  view  of  the  victory  of 
Calvary.  We  shall  never  know,  until  we  enter  into  the 
presence  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  himself  and  have  all 
eternity  to  understand  it,  the  fulness  of  the  meaning  of 
the  finished  work  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  Calvary 


50 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


means  Victory,  and  that  is  the  message  we  want  to  send 
throughout  the  world  to-day ;  it  is  the  message  of  deliver¬ 
ance  and  the  message  of  hope  and  the  message  of  power 
for  the  Church  of  God.  If  she  will  only  enter  into  the 
meaning  of  the  cross  and  appropriate  all  the  cross  has  done 
for  her  in  that  perfect  finished  work,  Calvary  spells 
Victory. 

So  the  teaching  of  Christ  and  the  Holy  Spirit  through 
the  Gospels  is  that  the  cross  is  to  be  the  supreme  force  in 
life  for  holiness — not  only  for  salvation,  but  for  holiness, 
and  the  supreme  power  for  us  over  everything  that  is  evil. 

Third,  what  does  Christ  mean  by  the  cross?  What  is 
Christ’s  own  witness  in  the  Gospels  to  the  cross  ?  As  you 
study  the  Gospels  you  will  find  at  least  a  fivefold  witness 
that  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  gives  to  you  and  to  me  with 
regard  to  his  death  on  the  cross.  The  very  first  thing  that 
he  emphasizes  is  that  it  is  the  secret  of  all  fruitful  living. 
“And  he  that  taketh  not  his  cross,  and  folio weth  after  me, 
is  not  worthy  of  me.  He  that  findeth  his  life  shall  lose 
it;  and  he  that  loseth  his  life  for  my  sake  shall  find  it” 
(Matt.  10:38,  39)  ;  “Then  said  Jesus  unto  his  disciples, 
If  any  man  will  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself,  and 
take  up  his  cross,  and  follow  me.  For  whosoever  will 
save  his  life  shall  lose  it:  and  whosoever  will  lose  his  life 
for  my  sake  shall  find  it”  (Matt.  16:24,  25).  The  word 
“life”  there,  in  the  Greek,  is  just  the  word  that  we  trans¬ 
late  to-day  into  “psychic.”  We  use  it  so  much  these  days, 
psychic  or  psychical,  it  is  just  the  natural  life. 

This  is  the  difference  between  all  these  false  cults  of 
the  world  to-day  and  the  message  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
that  they  all  have  to  develop  the  psychic,  they  are  all  put¬ 
ting  emphasis  upon  the  natural  life  in  man,  the  natural 
thing  in  man,  and  there  is  a  sort  of  deification  to-day  of 
this  human  element  in  man.  But  the  message  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  is  not  to  develop  the  psychic,  but  to  send  it 
to  the  cross.  That  is  the  only  pathway  of  safety  for  you 
and  for  me,  “Whosoever  will  save  his  life,  whosoever  will 
develop  the  psychic  or  the  natural  in  him  [and  that  is 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


51 


what  spiritism  and  all  those  things  are  doing],  shall  lose 
it.”  That  means  it  will  come  to  ruin,  and  he  will  find  it 
goes  from  him  and  he  does  not  get  out  of  it  what  God 
means  him  to  get.  “Whosoever  will  lose  his  life  [who¬ 
soever  will  let  these  things  that  are  merely  human  and 
natural,  and  that  can  be  worked  on  by  the  devil;  whoso¬ 
ever  will  let  these  things  go  to  the  cross,  keep  the  cross 
between  himself  and  those  things]  for  my  sake  shall  find 
it.”  That  means  he  will  discover  the  place  and  the  pur¬ 
pose  and  the  power  of  the  natural,  and  he  will  get  out  of 
the  natural  all  that  God  means  him  to  get. 

Let  us  remember  that  fruit  never  comes  through  the 
development  of  the  natural  in  us,  but  through  the  develop¬ 
ment  of  the  spiritual,  through  the  supremacy  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  in  life.  The  source  of  fruit  in  the  believer’s  life  is 
Christ,  Christ  living  in  him.  When  I  say  that  the  fruit 
never  comes  through  the  natural  I  do  not  mean  that  God 
does  not  use  our  natural  gifts,  our  minds,  our  faculties, 
but  fruit  never  comes  through  fleshly  energy,  never  comes 
through  soulish  power,  it  never  comes  through  the  natural 
becoming  supreme  over  the  spiritual.  Fruit  is  only 
the  result  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  living  in  you  and  me, 
working  in  you  and  in  me,  and  putting  his  power  through 
us,  our  minds,  our  gifts,  our  faculties  and  everything  else. 

Therefore,  in  John  12:24  and  32,  and  you  have  these 
gifts  by  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  “Verily,  Verily,  I  say  unto 
you,  Except  a  corn  of  wheat  fall  into  the  ground  and  die, 
it  abideth  alone:  but  if  it  die,  it  bringeth  forth  much  fruit.” 
“And  I,  if  I  be  lifted  up  from  the  earth,  will  draw  all  men 
unto  me.”  “Except  a  corn  of  wheat  fall  into  the  ground 
and  die,”  there  is  the  natural,  “it  abideth  alone,”  it  brings 
forth  nothing  for  God,  nothing  for  men,  “but  if  it  die,  it 
bringeth  forth  much  fruit.” 

There  is  the  secret  of  a  fruitful  life  for  you  and  for  me. 
It  is  the  cross  at  work  in  our  natures,  our  characters,  doing 
in  us,  and  for  us,  and  through  us,  what  is  done  in,  and  for, 
and  through  that  grain  of  wheat  as  it  lies  in  the  grave  of 
the  ground.  Christ  was  the  first  grain  of  wheat  to  fall  into 


52 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


the  ground  and  die,  and  out  of  his  death  has  come  every¬ 
thing  that  we  know  to-day  of  Christian  life,  Christian 
faith,  Christian  power,  Christian  influence,  Christian  hope. 
He  says,  “Follow  me.  If  anyone  will  be  my  disciple  let 
him  take  up  the  cross,  let  him  lose  his  life,  and  follow  me.” 

It  is  so  possible  for  us  to  have  redeemed  lives,  with 
which  perhaps  little  or  no  fault  could  be  found,  and  in 
which  little  or  no  fruit  can  be  discovered,  simply  because 
there  is  no  death  to  that  which  God  cannot  use — no  death 
to  that  which  Satan  is  always  trying  to  use.  It  is  possible 
to  save  your  life  and  get  nothing  out  of  it.  It  is  only  as 
we  go  in  the  steps  of  the  Saviour  that  there  can  go  out 
from  us  in  disposition  and  service  the  life  that  reveals 
Christ  and  the  life  that  reproduces  the  Christ  life  in  all 
its  wondrous  power  to  bear  fruit  for  God  and  for  men. 

What  does  it  mean  ?  I  wonder  if  I  can  make  it  simple 
enough.  You  remember  how  it  is  said  that  Christ  poured 
out  his  soul  unto  death.  He  took  his  natural  life  and  he 
laid  it  down  in  death.  Now  the  soul  is  the  seat  of  our 
senses,  is  the  seat  of  our  personality,  the  seat  of  our  self- 
life.  That  is  the  source  of  all  the  mischief  and  all  the 
weakness  in  our  lives  and  in  our  selves.  Think  of  the 
forms  in  which  that  self-life  appears  even  among  Christian 
people,  in  pride,  in  temper,  in  pettiness,  in  quickness  to 
take  offense,  in  mis  judgment  of  others,  misinterpretation 
of  the  words  of  others,  self-love,  self-pity,  self-preserva¬ 
tion,  and  so  on.  Oh,  the  forms  are  innumerable  in  which 
the  self-life  can  appear.  The  Lord  Jesus  Christ  says  that 
whenever  any  one  of  those  forms  appears  we  are  not  to 
develop  them,  but  to  say,  “That  is  for  the  cross.  That 
must  go  to  the  cross.  That  goes  to  the  cross.  I  die  to 
that,  I  take  the  position  of  death  to  that.” 

May  the  blessed  Holy  Spirit  make  the  victory  of 
Calvary  real  to  you,  and  the  moment  that  you  take  up  that 
attitude  in  your  heart  and  your  will  you  are  opening  the 
door  for  the  Holy  Spirit  to  come  in  with  the  life  of  Christ 
and  Romans  8 : 2  becomes  a  perfect  reality  and  a  blessed 
experience  to  you:  “For  the  law  of  the  Spirit  of  life  in 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


53 


Christ  Jesus  hath  made  me  free  from  the  law  of  sin  and 
death.”  The  moment  you  take  up  that  attitude  of  say¬ 
ing,  “That  is  for  the  cross.  I  am  not  going  to  let  self- 
love  get  the  better  of  me;  I  am  not  going  to  let  temper 
get  the  better  of  me.  It  goes  to  the  cross,  I  die  to  it,  I 
put  the  cross  between  that  and  me,  and  I  ask  the  Holy 
Spirit  to  make  the  power  of  the  cross  real  in  my  experi¬ 
ence” — the  moment  we  take  up  that  attitude  the  Holy 
Spirit  finds  the  open  door  into  our  lives  with  the  life  of 
Christ  which  produces  fruit,  and  the  corn  of  wheat  dies, 
and  the  fruit  comes  for  God. 

That  attitude  will  mean  for  you  and  for  me  just  what 
the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  meant  for  him.  What 
was  that?  “I  am  he  that  liveth,  and  was  dead;  and, 
behold,  I  am  alive  for  evermore”  (Rev.  1:18).  Before 
he  went  to  the  cross  he  said,  “I  lay  down  my  life.  I  have 
power  to  lay  it  down,  and  I  have  power  to  take  it  again.” 
He  took  it  again  in  resurrection  power,  and  that  is  the 
result  of  your  taking  up  this  position  of  death  to  sin,  it 
is  resurrection  life  and  power. 

Paul,  in  Philippians  3:10,  declared  this  to  be  his  ambi¬ 
tion — that  he  might  know  Christ  more  and  more  in  the 
power  of  his  resurrection.  So  as  you  definitely  and 
deliberately,  cost  what  it  may,  send  the  forms  of  the  self¬ 
life  to  the  cross  you  come  to  know  the  resurrection  of 
Christ ;  dying  to  sin,  you  are  alive  unto  God. 

“Except  a  corn  of  wheat  fall  into  the  ground  and  die 
it  abideth  alone,  but  if  it  die  it  bringeth  forth  much  fruit.” 
Dying  is  the  gate  of  life,  it  is  the  pathway  of  power,  it  is 
the  secret  of  victory,  it  is  the  source  of  heart  rest,  it  is  the 
secret  of  all  that  can  make  life  what  God  means  it  to  be 
and  what  God  wants  it  to  be.  That  is  the  witness  of 
Christ  to  the  cross.  It  is  the  secret  of  a  fruitful  life  for 
God  and  for  men. 

Take  the  second  thing,  and  he  tells  us  that  the  cross 
binds  together.  The  Lord  tells  us  that  the  cross  binds 
together  forces  for  the  deliverance  of  souls.  Turn  to  one 
passage,  Matthew  17:20,  21,  which  is  a  very  important 


54 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


passage.  In  answer  to  the  question  of  the  disciples,  Why 
could  not  we  cast  out  these  demons?  “Jesus  said  unto 
them,  Because  of  your  unbelief :  for  verily  I  say  unto  you, 
If  ye  have  faith  as  a  grain  of  mustard  seed,  ye  shall  say 
unto  this  mountain,  Remove  hence  to  yonder  place;  and 
it  shall  remove ;  and  nothing  shall  be  impossible  unto  you. 
Howbeit  this  kind  goeth  not  out  but  by  prayer  and  fast¬ 
ing.” 

Our  Lord  reveals  there  a  threefold  power  that  he  means 
us  to  use  in  order  to  bind  the  forces  of  evil  and  deliver 
souls  from  these  forces.  There  is  first  of  all  faith,  which 
is  the  link  with  the  power;  there  is  prayer,  which  puts 
the  power  into  action,  and  then  there  is  what  he  calls  fast¬ 
ing.  Now  what  is  fasting  for  the  Christian?  It  is  far 
more  than  abstinence  from  food  and  drink.  For  the 
Christian,  the  principle  underlying  fasting  is  not  physical, 
but  spiritual,  of  that  I  am  quite  sure. 

You  remember  that  God  appointed  one  great  fast  for 
his  people,  the  Day  of  Atonement,  which  numbers  among 
them  inferred  to  mean  abstinence  from  food;  but  God 
distinctly  said,  “It  is  a  day  for  afflicting  your  souls  because 
of  sin.”  That  Day  of  Atonement  was  for  taking  away 
everything  that  had  been  separating  them  from  God  in 
their  worship  and  in  their  life.  Other  fasts  were  added 
in  time  of  distress  and  religious  zeal,  and  they  added  fasts 
themselves  until,  in  Christ’s  day,  the  Pharisee  could  say 
with  tremendous  pride,  “I  fast  twice  a  week,”  and  brought 
down  upon  him  the  rebuke  of  Christ  for  hypocrisy.  The 
idea  of  fasting  is  shutting  out  something,  and  for  the 
Christian  it  is  just  what  Paul  emphasizes  when  he  bids  the 
Christian  give  up  lawful  things  that  are  not  expedient, 
things  that  are  not  spiritual,  things  that  become  material 
for  Satan  to  work  on;  things  the  possession  of  which 
plays  into  the  hands  of  evil  powers ;  something,  perhaps, 
that  keeps  you  from  fellowship  with  God;  something, 
perhaps,  quite  lawful,  that  yet  blunts  your  appetite  for 
the  Word  of  God  or  for  prayer ;  something,  perhaps,  of  a 
trifling  nature,  that  takes  the  time  which  ought  to  be 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


55 


devoted  to  things  of  a  serious  nature;  something,  perhaps, 
that  creates  an  atmosphere  around  your  life  that  robs  your 
life  of  power  just  at  the  crucial  moment. 

Paul  says  these  things  have  to  be  given  up,  we  have  to 
fast  from  them,  we  have  to  shut  our  eyes  to  them.  But 
it  goes  very  much  deeper  than  that.  It  means  the  giving 
of  one’s  self,  by  a  definite  act  of  yieldedness,  to  God. 
Fasting  in  a  Christian  sense  is  the  principle  of  the  renun¬ 
ciation  of  self  as  the  master  force  in  your  life,  and  the 
crowning  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  in  its  place.  You  close 
your  life  against  yourself  and  open  your  life  to  God,  and 
then  you  maintain  that  attitude  of  surrender  day  by  day. 

Here  comes  in  the  work  of  this  threefold  force.  Prayer 
becomes  the  central  force  for  the  deliverance  of  men  and 
women  from  sin  and  from  powers  of  evil;  for  prayer, 
remember,  is  more  than  devotion,  is  more  than  communion, 
is  more  than  mere  intercession ;  prayer  is  the  mightiest 
weapon  that  God  puts  into  your  hands  to  smite  the  power 
of  evil  on  the  ground  of  victory  at  Calvary.  Therefore 
prayer  becomes  more  of  a  work  than  a  word  when  you 
come  to  understand  the  meaning  of  it.  Prayer  is  doing 
business  for  God  in  the  spiritual  realm.  Therefore  the 
apostle  Paul  says,  “we  wrestle  not  with  flesh  and  blood.” 
How  much  time  we  waste  wrestling  with  flesh  and  blood, 
trying  to  get  a  man  to  see  a  truth  from  our  point  of  view, 
trying  to  argue  a  man  around  to  our  opinion  of  what  belief 
means,  of  what  something  else  spiritual  means.  Paul  says, 
“Wrestle  not  with  flesh  and  blood,  but  with  those  spirit 
forces  of  evil  that  are  behind  flesh  and  blood.” 

That  is  what  prayer  means,  I  believe,  more  than  any¬ 
thing  else ;  for  we  are  in  a  fight,  and  do  not  let  any  one 
forget  it,  a  fight  that  is  growing  hotter  and  hotter  as  the 
end  approaches,  and  you  need  to  know  how  to  use  the 
weapon  of  prayer  on  the  ground  of  the  victory  of  Calvary, 
if  you  are  going  to  stand  against  the  forces  of  darkness 
that  are  all  round  about  you  and  that  are  driving  in  upon 
Christian  churches  and  Christian  lives  in  the  most  terrible 
way.  Prayer  becomes  the  central  force  for  the  deliverance 


56 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


of  souls.  Faith  links  us  on,  faith  links  the  prayer  on  to 
that  power,  and  then  the  fasting,  or  the  cross,  is  what 
breaks  all  the  hindrances  to  that  power  manifesting  itself 
in  service. 

Let  me  put  it  in  this  way,  fasting  takes  you  to  Romans 
6 :6,  “Knowing  this,  that  our  old  man  is  crucified  with  him, 
that  the  body  of  sin  might  be  destroyed,  that  henceforth 
we  should  not  serve  sin,”  and  makes  faith  union  with 
Christ  a  fact,  and  then  faith  takes  you  to  Romans  8:2, 
“For  the  law  of  the  Spirit  of  life  in  Christ  Jesus  hath 
made  me  free  from  the  law  of  sin  and  death,”  and  makes 
life  union  through  the  Holy  Spirit  a  fact;  and  prayer 
becomes  the  force  for  deliverance  on  the  ground  of 
Calvary,  in  co-operation  with  the  Spirit  of  God. 

Third,  Christ  says  the  cross  marks  out  the  path  of  the 
true  servant,  “And  whosoever  will  be  chief  among  you, 
let  him  be  your  servant :  even  as  the  Son  of  man  came  not 
to  be  ministered  unto,  but  to  minister,  and  to  give  his  life 
a  ransom  for  many”  (Matt.  20:27,  28)  ;  “But  Jesus  said 
unto  them,  Ye  know  not  what  ye  ask:  can  ye  drink  of 
the  cup  that  I  drink  of.  And  be  baptized  with  the  baptism 
that  I  am  baptized  with?”  (Mark  10:38)  ;  “But  I  have  a 
baptism  to  be  baptized  with;  and  how  am  I  straitened 
till  it  be  accomplished!”  (Luke  12:50);  “Ought  not 
Christ  to  have  suffered  these  things,  and  to  enter  into  his 
glory?”  (Luke  24:26)  ;  “And  said  unto  them,  Thus  it  is 
written,  and  thus  it  behoved  Christ  to  suffer,  and  to  rise 
from  the  dead  the  third  day”  (Luke  24:46).  I  just  want 
you  to  remember  Luke  9:51,  “He  steadfastly  set  his  face 
to  go  to  Jerusalem.”  That  is  the  path  of  the  true  servant. 
It  is  not  the  path  of  self-pleasing  and  self-interest,  it  is 
not  the  path  that  others  say  is  the  path  for  you.  Never 
take  a  path  that  others  say  you  ought  to  take.  Never  take 
a  path  of  service  that  people  say  you  ought  to  take.  Only 
the  cross  can  mark  out  the  path  of  service  for  you,  and  the 
cross  marks  out  the  path  of  service  towards  Jerusalem. 

What  does  that  mean?  God’s  chosen  path  for  you  in 
which  you  are  to  do  his  will,  even  though  it  means  Jeru- 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


57 


salem.  And  Jerusalem  for  Christ  meant  loneliness,  for¬ 
sakenness,  sacrifice.  I  want  to  quote  to  you  a  passage  from 
a  letter  which  I  was  reading  the  other  day  with  great 
pleasure,  by  David  Livingstone.  New  letters  have  been 
printed  which  were  written  to  his  brother  Charles.  When 
his  wife  and  family  left  for  England  on  April  23,  1852, 
this  is  what  he  wrote:  “My  heart  is  very  sore.  I  shall 
never  see  my  children  again.  They  will  grow  out  of  my 
knowledge  and  will  all  forget  me ;  but  I  grudge  Him  noth¬ 
ing  who  died  for  me.  My  tears  flow,  but  he  knows  that 
my  heart  grudges  him  nothing  of  all  that  I  have.'’ 

Now  do  you  see  it  in  a  practical  form?  David  Living¬ 
stone  was  the  corn  of  wheat.  Do  you  see  it?  A  corn  of 
wheat,  and  what  fruit  has  come  out  of  that  corn  of  wheat! 
He  trod  the  path  of  a  true  servant  and  trod  it  in  a  spirit 
of  sacrifice.  What  the  cross  is  calling  for  to-day  is  lives 
full  of  devotion,  full  of  sacrifice,  reckless  souls  is  the  call 
of  Christ  to-day,  reckless  souls — not  reckless  in  the  flesh, 
that  is  no  good — but  reckless  because  of  union  with  Christ, 
reckless  in  sacrifice,  reckless  in  devotion. 

The  fourth  thing  I  can  only  mention.  The  cross  gives 
victory  over  the  powers  of  evil:  “When  a  strong  man 
armed  keepeth  his  palace,  his  goods  are  in  peace ;  but  when 
a  stronger  than  he  shall  come  upon  him,  and  overcome 
him,  he  taketh  from  him  all  his  armour  wherein  he  trusted, 
and  divideth  his  spoils”  (Luke  11:21,  22);  “Behold,  I 
give  unto  you  power  to  tread  on  serpents  and  scorpions, 
and  over  all  the  power  of  the  enemy :  and  nothing  shall  by 
any  means  hurt  you”  (Luke  10 : 19 )  ;  “Now  is  the  judgment 
of  this  world ;  now  shall  the  prince  of  this  world  be  cast 
out”  (John  12:31). 

I  warn  you  to-day  that  the  powers  of  evil  are  out  in  full 
force.  Do  not  shut  your  eyes  to  the  tremendous  develop¬ 
ments  of  evil  that  are  going  on  in  the  spiritual  realm. 
These  forces  of  evil  are  at  work  in  the  most  subtle,  cun¬ 
ning,  and  insidious  way.  You  will  find  them  in  all  the 
cults  of  the  world,  these  religious  cults,  and  only  as  you 
learn  to  watch,  and  only  as  you  learn  to  walk  in  obedience 


58 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


to  the  Holy  Spirit,  only  as  you  let  him  work  in  you  the 
purpose  of  the  cross,  are  you  safe  from  the  powers  of 
evil  and  the  wiles  of  the  devil  by  which  he  is  deceiving  and 
deluding  multitudes. 

Turn  to  Luke  10:19  and  read  it,  and  ask  God  the  Holy 
Spirit  to  make  you  know  what  it  means,  for  Christ  has 
given  His  children  authority  to  tread  upon  all  the  power 
of  the  enemy  to-day  and  stand  in  victory.  There  is  noth¬ 
ing  adverse  that  you  cannot  have  under  your  feet,  because 
it  is  already  under  his  feet. 

One  word  more,  the  fifth  thing  that  the  Lord  shows  us- 
in  the  Gospels.  The  cross  opens  the  way  to  the  indwelling 
of  Christ.  “He  that  eateth  my  flesh,  and  drinketh  my 
blood,  dwelleth  in  me,  and  I  in  him”  (John  6:56) ;  “Yet 
a  little  while,  and  the  world  seeth  me  no  more,  but  ye  see 
me:  because  I  live,  ye  shall  live  also”  (John  14:19,  20) : 
compare  with  Galatians  2 :20,  “I  am  crucified  with  Christ : 
nevertheless  I  live,  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth  in  me:  and 
the  life  which  I  now  live  in  the  flesh  I  live  by  the  faith  of 
the  Son  of  God,  who  loved  me,  and  gave  himself  for  me.” 

“He  that  eateth  my  flesh,  and  drinketh  my  blood, 
dwelleth  in  me,  and  I  in  him.”  There  is  a  natural  union 
when  Christ  and  I  become  one,  Christ  in  me  and  I  in 
Christ.  What  is  the  flesh  that  we  are  to  eat?  It  is  not 
the  flesh  of  the  dead  Christ,  not  the  flesh  that  was  nailed 
to  the  cross ;  it  is  the  flesh  of  the  risen  Son  of  God.  That 
is  to  say  this,  our  worship  is  not  with  a  dead  Christ,  and 
our  union  is  not  with  a  dead  Christ.  Our  fellowship  and 
our  union  are  with  the  living  Son  of  God.  Let  that  sink 
into  your  minds  and  it  will  make  you  understand  the 
blessedness. 

“Let  me  come  closer  to  Thee,  Jesus ; 

Oh,  closer  day  by  day! 

Let  me  lean  harder  on  Thee,  Jesus, 

Yes,  harder  all  the  way. 

“In  all  my  heart  and  will,  O  Jesus, 

Be  altogether  King ! 

Make  me  a  loyal  subject,  Jesus, 

To  Thee  in  everything.’' 


The  Cross  in  the  Gospels 


59 


Prayer 

Lord  Jesus,  we  pray  Thee,  by  Thy  power,  to  guard 
every  word  that  has  been  uttered  in  the  Spirit.  Guard 
these  words  in  our  minds  that  they  may  not  be  taken  out 
of  our  minds,  that  Thy  Word  may  do  in  each  one  of  us 
all  that  Thou  meanest  it  to  do  for  the  strengthening  of 
our  lives  to  real  service  and  fruitfulness  in  service,  to  the 
glory  of  Thy  name.  Amen. 


V 


THE  CROSS  IN  THE  EPISTLES 

WE  TURN  to  the  Cross  in  the  Epistles.  As  an  illus¬ 
tration  of  the  teaching  of  the  cross  in  the  epistles 
I  would  turn  your  attention  to  the  First  Epistle  of 
Peter.  In  the  fifth  chapter  and  the  twelfth  verse  you  will 
get  the  reason  for  writing  the  epistle:  “By  Silvanus,  a 
faithful  brother  unto  you,  as  I  suppose,  I  have  written 
briefly,  exhorting,  and  testifying  that  this  is  the  true  grace 
of  God  wherein  ye  stand.” 

The  Jewish  Christians  were  living  in  difficult  days. 
Persecution  made  it  very  easy  to  yield  to  the  temptation  to 
fall  away,  and  the  apostle  therefore  speaks  to  his  readers 
here  of  their  standing  ground  in  the  true  grace  of  God  and 
exhorts  them  to  stand  fast. 

Peter’s  purpose  in  writing  this  epistle  is  to  bring  to  our 
knowledge  this  fact:  that  in  the  Old  Testament  and  in  the 
New  Testament  alike  the  sufferings  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  are  the  center  of  the  world’s  history. 

If  you  will  turn  to  the  first  chapter  you  will  find  three 
things  there  asserted  by  the  apostle.  In  the  tenth  verse 
(“Of  which  salvation  the  prophets  have  enquired  and 
searched  diligently,  who  prophesied  of  the  grace  that 
should  come  unto  you :  searching  what,  or  what  manner  of 
time  the  Spirit  of  Christ  which  was  in  them  did  signify, 
when  it  testified  beforehand  the  sufferings  of  Christ,  and 
the  glory  that  should  follow”),  that  the  sufferings  of 

60 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


61 


Christ  were  the  substance  of  prophecy;  in  the  twelfth 
verse  (“Unto  whom  it  was  revealed,  that  not  unto  them¬ 
selves,  but  unto  us  they  did  minister  the  things,  which  are 
now  reported  unto  you  by  them  that  have  preached  the 
gospel  unto  you  with  the  Holy  Ghost  sent  down  from 
heaven;  which  things  the  angels  desire  to  look  into”),  that 
they  were  the  theme  of  the  Gospel,  and  also  in  that  verse 
the  study  of  the  ages.  The  substance  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  prophecy  is  the  death  of  Christ,  the  sufferings  of 
Christ  (1  Peter  1:10,  11)  ;  then  in  the  next  verse  (12th) 
you  find  it  is  the  theme  of  the  Gospel  and  the  study  of  the 
ages. 

You  will  note  that  where  Paul  speaks  of  the  death  or 
the  cross  of  Christ,  Peter  always  speaks  of  the  sufferings. 
Seven  times,  I  think,  in  his  epistle,  he  refers  to  this  word 
“suffering.”  He  tells  us  in  the  fifth  chapter  and  the  first 
verse  that  he  was  a  witness  of  the  sufferings  of  his  Mas¬ 
ter;  and  the  fact  of  them,  and  the  thought  of  them,  and 
the  meaning  of  them  was  so  deeply  impressed  upon  the 
mind  of  the  apostle  Peter  that  he  fills  his  epistle  with  the 
story  of  those  sufferings  and  their  practical  outcome ;  and 
you  cannot  read  this  epistle  without  seeing  that  he  wishes 
to  convince  his  readers  that  the  Christian  life  can  only  be 
viewed  rightly  as  light  from  the  cross  streams  upon  it,  and 
can  only  be  lived  perfectly  as  the  sufferings  of  Christ  are 
having  an  effective  result  in  spirit  and  mind  and  will. 

It  is  very  interesting  to  note  the  ideas  suggested  to  the 
mind  of  the  apostle  as  a  practical  outcome  of  the  death  of 
Christ.  You  will  find  that  each  one  is  introduced  by  the 
word  “that,”  “Christ  suffered  that’’  such  and  such  a  thing 
should  happen. 

If  you  will  just  keep  that  in  your  minds  and  follow 
through  this  epistle,  you  will  see  how  much  light  there  is 
streaming  from  the  cross  upon  the  Christian  life.  First  of 
all,  light  upon  our  faith  and  hope,  “Who  by  him  do 
believe  in  God,  that  raised  him  up  from  the  dead,  and 
gave  him  glory;  that  your  faith  and  hope  might  be  in 
God.”  There  is  the  object  of  our  faith  and  hope,  it  is  God. 


62 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


There  are  three  steps,  you  will  notice,  to  the  throne ;  in 
the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  verses  (“Forasmuch  as  ye 
know  that  ye  were  not  redeemed  with  corruptible  things, 
as  silver  and  gold,  from  your  vain  conversation  received  by 
tradition  from  your  fathers ;  but  with  the  precious  blood 
of  Christ,  as  of  a  lamb  without  blemish  and  without 
spot”),  the  redemption  of  Christ;  in  the  twentieth  verse 
(“Who  verily  was  foreordained  before  the  foundation  of 
the  world,  but  was  manifest  in  these  last  times  for  you”) 
the  foreordination  of  God,  and  in  the  twentieth  verse  also 
the  manifestation  by  Jesus  Christ.  Faith  and  hope  reach 
God  by  the  way  of  the  sacrifice  of  the  cross,  that  sacrifice 
that  was  thought  out  in  the  mind  of  God,  and  planned  by 
God  before  ever  the  foundations  of  the  earth  were  laid, 
and  then  personally  exhibited  in  all  its  richness  and  ful¬ 
ness  in  the  life  of  the  Son  of  God. 

So  Calvary  shows  us  the  eternal  source  of  faith  and 
hope  and  their  manifold  testings.  The  source  of  our  faith 
is  not  in  ourselves.  -The  source  of  our  hope  can  never  be 
in  our  circumstances,  but  the  source  of  our  faith  and  hope 
is  God  himself. 

That  faith  is  tried,  Peter  tells  you  in  the  sixth  verse,  by 
manifold  temptations,  testings.  There  never  has  been  a 
time  in  the  history  of  the  Christian  Church  that  believers 
have  not  been  tested  in  regard  to  their  faith.  The  testings 
of  faith  are  necessary  to  prove  the  genuineness  and  the 
value  of  that  faith. 

I  was  preaching  one  summer  in  the  month  of  June,  in 
one  of  the  loveliest  parts  of  Scotland,  in  the  North,  in 
the  region  where  the  gorse  and  the  broom  bloom.  In  the 
month  of  June  they  are  at  their  loveliest,  and  you  see  the 
hillside  covered  with  great  patches  of  gold  and  green. 
Never  have  I  seen  the  gorse  and  broom  so  luxuriant  and  so 
plentiful.  I  was  speaking  to  a  lady  about  it  one  day  and 
she  said,  “Do  you  know  the  reason  why  the  bushes  are  so 
large  and  magnificent  this  year?  They  were  all  severely 
burned  last  year.”  So  it  was  out  of  this  furnace  of  fire 
that  they  came  with  their  richness  and  their  beauty.  And 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


63 


it  is  just  out  of  the  furnace  that  our  faith  and  our  hope 
come  to  be  of  real  value  both  to  the  object  and  to  the 
owner.  Faith  has  to  be  tested. 

You  will  notice  also  (thirdly)  that  the  hope  which  is 
ours  is  a  living  hope.  It  springs  into  birth  through  the 
sufferings  of  Christ,  and  gains  its  immortal,  quenchless 
power  in  the  resurrection  of  Christ,  and  it  has  a  practical 
influence,  “Sanctify  the  Lord  God  in  your  hearts:  and  be 
ready  always  to  give  an  answer  to  every  man  that  asketh 
you  a  reason  of  the  hope  that  is  in  you  with  meekness  and 
fear”  (3: 15).  That  living  hope  always  leads  to  holiness, 
and  the  measure  in  which  we  sanctify  the  Lord  in  our 
hearts  gives  us  the  proof  of  the  reality  of  that  hope. 

Second,  light  upon  the  plan  of  service,  “But  ye  are  a 
chosen  generation,  a  royal  priesthood,  an  holy  nation,  a 
peculiar  people;  that  ye  should  shew  forth  the  praises  of 
him  who  hath  called  you  out  of  darkness  into  his  mar¬ 
vellous  light”  (2:9).  The  first  part  of  that  ninth  verse 
is  explained  by  the  tenth  verse.  Let  us  read  the  first  half 
of  verse  nine  and  then  the  tenth  verse:  “But  ye  are  a 
chosen  generation,  a  royal  priesthood,  an  holy  nation,  a 
peculiar  people, — which  in  time  past  were  not  a  people, 
but  are  now  the  people  of  God:  which  had  not  obtained 
mercy,  but  now  have  obtained  mercy.”  You  can  see  that 
the  mercy  of  God  in  Christ  is  what  changes  our  whole 
character,  and  through  that  mercy  have  we  become  what 
is  spoken  of  in  the  former  part  of  the  ninth  verse,  a  chosen 
generation,  that  we  should  show  forth  the  praise  or  the 
excellencies  of  him  who  hath  called  us  out  of  darkness 
into  his  marvelous  light. 

Notice  the  word  “that  ye  should  shew  forth.”  It  is  a 
very  emphatic  word.  It  is  found,  I  think,  nowhere  else 
in  the  Greek  in  the  New  Testament.  It  means  this,  to 
proclaim  to  those  who  stand  without  what  you  have 
learned  within.  You  remember  that  the  Greeks  had  two 
words  to  describe  the  temple.  There  was  one  word  which 
they  used  for  the  holy  precincts  of  the  temple,  the  taber¬ 
nacle  and  the  courts  where  the  people  gathered,  but  they 


64 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


had  a  special  word  which  they  used  of  the  Holy  of 
Holies,  and  that  place  was  where  only  the  priests  could 
enter.  The  idea  in  Peter’s  mind  is  this :  God’s  plan  for 
the  priests, — and  I  use  the  word  in  the  Scriptural  sense, 
which  is  the  only  proper  sense  in  which  to  use  it,  that 
every  believer  is  a  priest, — is  not  that  he  should  stay  in¬ 
side  the  Holy  of  Holies  always,  just  simply  enjoying  what 
he  hears  and  what  he  sees,  but  that  he  is  to  go  outside  to 
the  people  who  are  without  and  tell  to  them  what  he  has 
learned  and  what  he  has  seen  in  the  sacred  place. 

Salvation,  which  is  ours  by  the  mercy  of  God  through' 
the  atoning  sacrifice  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  is  not  a 
selfish  prerogative,  but  it  is  a  sacred  privilege  to  be  used 
in  all  its  meaning  and  power  in  a  true  service  which 
reaches  the  world  in  its  darkness  and  its  despair.  Never 
let  us  forget  that  the  world  takes  its  idea  of  God  from 
those  who  claim  to  be  of  the  family  of  God.  Therefore 
we  have  been  saved  by  grace  and  filled  with  the  Spirit  of 
God  to  be  the  mirrors  of  God,  to  be  the  reflectors  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  of  his  life. 

I  think  our  salvation  is  faulty  if  we  ever  forget  that. 
The  world  hears  of  Jesus  (it  never  heard  so  much  of 
Jesus  as  it  is  hearing  to-day),  but  it  sees  you  and  me. 
What  does  it  see?  We  have  been  redeemed  in  order  that 
we  might  show  forth,  that  we  might  go  outside  and  tell 
to  the  people  the  excellencies,  the  power  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ.  What  is  it  seeing  in  you  and  in  me?  Does  it  see 
that  we  are  the  chosen  people  of  God  and  that  God  has 
not  made  a  wrong  choice  of  us  ?  Does  it  see  that  we  are 
a  royal  priesthood,  that  there  is  something  royal  in  us, 
royal  in  our  bearing,  royal  in  our  disposition,  that  there 
is  a  strain  of  royalty  in  our  character?  Does  it  see  in  us 
a  holy  nature,  and  that  our  holiness  is  practical  ?  Does  it 
see  that  we  are  the  peculiar  people  of  God?  Not  odd  peo¬ 
ple,  but  people  who  have  been  bought  by  him,  for  him, 
separated  unto  him,  set  apart  for  his  service?  This  is 
what  they  ought  to  see. 

To  accomplish  this  great  thing  is  the  purpose  of  the 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


65 


cross,  and  that  is  the  light  the  cross  throws  upon  the 
plan  of  service  for  each  one  of  us,  that  God  gives  us 
nothing  for  ourselves,  it  is  only  for  others ;  and  it  is  only 
as  we  pass  it  on  to  others  that  we  know  the  value  of  it 
for  ourselves. 

Third,  there  is  light  on  the  pathway  of  life,  “For  even 
hereunto  were  ye  called ;  because  Christ  also  suffered  for 
us,  leaving  us  an  example,  that  ye  should  follow  his  steps : 
who  did  no  sin,  neither  was  guile  found  in  his  mouth: 
who,  when  he  was  reviled,  reviled  not  again;  when  he 
suffered,  he  threatened  not ;  but  committed  himself  to  him 
that  judgeth  righteously”  (2:21-23). 

We  have  a  marvelous  passage  here,  the  most  wonder¬ 
ful  event  in  human  history  is  revealed  here  as  regulating 
the  commonplaces  of  our  daily  lives.  Note  that  the  suffer¬ 
ings  and  the  example  of  Christ  are  united  and  they  never 
can  be  separated.  You  cannot  lift  up  Christ  as  Saviour 
without  emphasizing  the  place  that  he  has  a  right  to  fill 
in  human  life,  and  the  influence  that  he  means  to  exert 
in  human  service. 

On  the  other  hand  you  err,  and  greatly  err,  if  you  try 
to  put  any  difference  between  Christ  as  a  Redeemer  and 
Christ  as  an  Exemplar  and  set  them  up  as  if  they  could 
be  set  up  in  rivalry  one  to  the  other.  If  you  want  to  know 
the  example  of  Christ  you  must  begin  at  the  cross  with 
him.  If  you  want  to  know  the  practical  experience  of  the 
cross  then  you  must  follow  him  as  your  example,  “If  any 
man  will  be  my  disciple  let  him  take  up  his  cross  and  fol¬ 
low  me.”  And  what  God  hath  joined  together  let  no  man 
put  asunder.  Christ  is  my  example  only  in  the  measure  in 
which  he  is  my  Saviour. 

The  two  offices  of  Christ  are  like  the  two  sides  of  a 
court.  They  are  both  distinct,  and  yet  perfectly  related 
the  one  to  the  other.  So  here  God  shows  us  the  steps  of 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  which  he  took  with  bleeding  feet 
right  up  to  the  cross,  and  he  says,  “Follow  me.”  There 
is  light  on  the  pathway  of  life. 

Shall  we  look  at  those  steps?  The  first  was,  “He  did 


66 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


no  sin.”  In  the  midst  of  all  the  ill  treatment  to  which  he 
was  subjected  he  never  sinned.  Second,  he  did  no  guile. 
There  was  no  crookedness  in  him,  there  were  no  false 
motives  in  his  service,  there  was  no  compromising  in  his 
spirit,  there  was  absolute  straightness  in  every  thought  and 
word  and  act  on  the  part  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  Follow  him. 

Third,  there  was  no  retaliation,  when  he  was  reviled  he 
did  not  revile.  The  Lord  never  paid  back  his  enemies 
in  their  own  coin. 

Fourth,  there  was  no  self-vindication.  When  he  suf¬ 
fered  he  did  not  threaten,  he  did  not  stand  in  his  own 
defense.  Again  and  again  when  he  was  attacked  by  his 
enemies,  it  is  written  in  the  Word  of  God,  “He  answered 
them  nothing.” 

Whenever  the  honor  of  his  Father  was  touched  words 
sprang  to  his  lips,  but  whenever  anything  concerned  him¬ 
self  he  was  silent.  There  was  no  self-vindication  in  the 
Lord’s  life. 

Here  you  have  Christian  ethics  upon  a  grand  scale.  And 
they  have  all  had  their  birth  at  Calvary.  I  sometimes  hear 
ministers  in  my  own  country  (perhaps  they  are  not  very 
distinguished  for  their  spirituality)  say,  “Oh,  yes,  I 
believe  in  an  ethical  revival,”  and  who  does  not?  Where 
was  there  ever  a  revival  in  the  history  of  the  Christian 
Church  that  did  not  produce  an  ethical  revival,  a  revival 
that  was  not  ethical?  A  revival  that  does  not  lift  the 
morals  of  the  people  is  no  revival  from  God.  In  that 
wonderful  Welsh  revival  in  1905,  of  which  I  saw  a  little, 
one  of  the  features  of  it  was  that  debts  were  paid,  and 
people  believed  in  revival.  Family  quarrels  were  made 
up,  family  relationships  were  changed ;  there  was  a  won¬ 
derful  ethical  revival  in  Wales.  But  what  was  the  cause 
of  it?  Calvary — the  preaching  of  Calvary. 

We  had  a  little  bit  of  a  revival  in  1921  in  Scotland, 
confined  largely  to  the  fisher-folk,  and  one  of  the  results 
was  that  in  many  places  the  fishermen  brought  their  pipes 
and  their  cigarettes  and  their  tobacco  pouches  and  their 
playing  cards  out  of  their  homes  and  out  of  their  pockets 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


67 


and  made  a  heap  of  them  and  had  a  great  bonfire.  Is 
this  not  a  real  ethical  revival?  The  public  houses  were 
practically  empty  and  the  drink  sellers  were  saying,  “The 
trade  is  gone.” 

That  was  an  ethical  revival,  but  what  was  the  root  of 
it?  The  sufferings  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  There  can 
be  no  ethical  revival  without  a  spiritual  revival.  A  Chris¬ 
tian  ethic  or  a  religious  ethic  without  the  Christian 
dynamic  of  the  cross  is  simply  something  that  is  cold  and 
self-righteous  without  any  power  or  any  influence.  True 
ethics  are  the  result  of  the  sufferings  of  Christ. 

Notice  the  fifth  step  of  the  Lord,  the  perfect  trust  in 
the  righteousness  of  God,  “He  committed  himself  to  him 
that  judgeth  righteously.”  Do  you  notice  that  that  was 
the  grand  revenge  he  took  upon  his  enemies?  He  com¬ 
mitted  himself  to  his  Father,  and  it  became  his  constant 
habit. 

There  is  light  on  the  pathway  of  life  just  in  ordinary, 
commonplace,  practical  ways  for  you  and  for  me.  Do 
not  ever  say  the  teaching  of  the  cross  is  not  practical. 
There  is  no  other  teaching  that  is  so  practical.  Every 
other  teaching  receives  its  practical  power  from  the  cross. 
There  is  light  upon  the  pathway  of  life  to  follow  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  the  example  of  Christ  is  the  nor¬ 
mal  life  of  the  Christian.  If  we  could  only  get  that  into 
our  minds.  It  is  not  for  conventions,  it  is  for  you  and  for 
me  when  we  go  back  to  the  home,  and  back  to  the  office, 
and  to  the  school,  and  if  we  have  it  only  at  conventions 
we  are  not  following  in  the  steps  of  the  Lord.  The  ex¬ 
ample  of  Christ  is  the  normal  life  for  the  Christian,  and, 
beloved  brother  and  sister,  it  is  the  only  safe  road  for 
you  to  travel.  To  be  guided  by  the  spirit  of  the  cross  is 
the  only  way  in  which  you  can  carry  out  the  full  purpose 
of  God  through  life. 

Is  that  picture  of  Christ  being  anything  like  realized  in 
you  and  in  me?  What  is  going  to  get  the  world  to-day  is 
not  printing  a  theology  but  living  a  theology.  The  world 
stands  to-day  with  a  sad,  sick  heart  at  the  controversies 


68 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


that  are  going  on  between  the  modernists  and  the  funda¬ 
mentalists,  sick  of  it  all,  heart-sore  in  its  awful,  despairing 
need,  and  what  is  going  to  help  that  little  bit  of  the  world 
through  which  you  pass  is  not  so  much  putting  a  tract  in 
its  hand  as  living  that  tract  just  where  you  are.  It  is  not 
the  printed  theology  that  the  world  cares  anything  for,  it 
is  the  living  theology,  it  is  a  Christian  being  the  Word  of 
God,  revealing  through  a  sanctified  life  the  knowledge  of 
God  for  which  the  world’s  heart  is  yearning  in  agony,  the 
knowledge  that  God  is  sufficient  through  Jesus  Christ  to 
meet  every  need,  to  solve  every  problem,  to  face  every 
test,  to  conquer  every  sin. 

Coming  to  the  fourth  point,  the  cross  shows  us  light 
upon  the  aim  of  life,  “Who  his  own  self  bare  our  sins  in 
his  own  body  on  the  tree,  that  we,  being  dead  to  sins, 
should  live  unto  righteousness”  (2:  24).  That  is  the  aim 
of  life  revealed  by  the  cross,  and  the  cross,  remember, 
makes  a  tremendous  demand  upon  us.  The  purpose  of 
the  cross  is  not  mere  salvation  from  hell,  mere  forgive¬ 
ness  of  sin;  the  cross  makes  this  tremendous  demand 
upon  us  for  righteousness,  and  not  righteousness  in  any 
limited  sense,  but  righteousness  towards  God,  righteous¬ 
ness  towards  the  world,  righteousness  towards  the  people 
of  God.  That  is  the  aim  that  is  set  before  us  by  the 
cross,  and  we  are  exhorted  to  seek  after  that  and  to 
reach  that,  to  have  a  life  that  has  an  eye  on  God,  that 
has  a  heart  breaking  with  love  for  the  perishing,  and  a 
hand  that  grasps  a  brother’s  hand.  “That  we,  being  dead 
to  sins,  should  live  unto  righteousness.” 

Righteousness  is  not  righteousness  if  it  can  leave  out 
any  one  who  is  in  the  plan  of  grace.  Righteousness  is  not 
righteousness  if  it  does  not  embrace  all  for  whom  God 
cares ;  and  our  aim,  if  we  are  to  be  true  to  this  motto, 
“Not  I,  but  Christ,” — must  be  the  full  plan  of  God  re¬ 
vealed  in  his  Word. 

We  are  a  chosen  generation,  a  royal  priesthood,  a  holy 
nation,  a  peculiar  people,  to  make  effective  in  life  what 
grace  has  brought  to  us;  and  grace  works  through  faith 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


69 


and  love  unto  downright  goodness,  righteousness  in  de¬ 
tails,  righteousness  in  the  hidden  things  as  well  as  in  the 
public  things.  That  is  the  practical  demand  of  the  cross, 
and  that  is  the  expectation  of  him  who  suffered,  that  we 
should  live  to  righteousness.  That  is  the  aim,  now  how  is 
it  to  be  done  ? 

Peter  shows  you  that  it  is  through  the  cross  working 
in  us  the  purpose  of  God.  Notice  that  the  cross  is  always 
at  the  back  of  every  demand  which  God  makes  upon  us, 
as  the  source  of  our  power  to  meet  that  demand  and 
respond  to  it.  The  cross  always  deals  with  that  which 
hinders  righteousness, — sin.  Here  you  have  a  revelation 
of  it  from  Peter,  “That  we,  being  dead  to  sin/’  Now 
Peter  is  following  simply  in  the  steps  of  Paul,  and  Peter 
and  Paul  follow  simply  in  the  steps  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  “Except  a  corn  of  wheat  fall  into  the  ground  and 
die,  it  abideth*  alone;  but  if  it  die,  it  bringeth  forth  much 
fruit.”  This  is  just  Peter's  way  of  expressing  “That 
we,  being  dead  to  every  hindrance  to  righteousness,  may 
live  the  righteous  life.”  “We,  being  dead,”  the  whole 
secret  of  victory  in  life  which  commends  the  Redeemer. 

And  perhaps  righteousness  lies  in  this ;  our  attitude  to 
sin  determines  our  position  for  life.  “Dead  to  sin,”  that 
is  the  work  of  the  cross.  There  is  nothing  you  and  I 
can  do.  That  is  the  message  of  the  cross,  “Be  dead  to  sin.” 
There  is  a  word  in  the  Greek  found  nowhere  else.  It 
literally  means  to  be  missing,  missing,  missing,  “Dead  to 
sin,”  to  be  in  a  position  to  sin  spiritually  that  a  man  is  in 
position  literally  to  the  Post  Office  when  the  Post  Office 
has  to  write  and  say,  “He  has  gone  and  left  no  address.” 
That  is  just  the  meaning  of  it,  to  be  missing.  It  is  just 
this,  that  when  the  old  master,  Sin,  comes  and  knocks  at 
the  door  of  your  heart,  he  finds  no  response  because  you 
are  missing,  you  are  dead,  and  there  is  a  new  master  in 
you  and  a  new  power  exercising  its  mighty  thrall  upon 
you,  so  that  the  old  thralldom  of  sin  has  been  broken, 
“That  you,  being  dead  to  sin,  may  live  unto  righteous¬ 
ness.” 


70 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


That  is  the  blessed  fruit  of  the  death  of  Christ.  As 
you  take  up  this  position  in  the  face  of  sin,  that  there  is 
no  response  to  you  because  there  is  a  new  power  in  you, 
then  you  live  unto  righteousness  and  you  achieve  the 
aim  of  redemption;  and  the  union  with  Christ  produces 
that,  that  is  the  true  aim  of  life. 

Is  it  our  aim?  Perhaps  some  of  my  younger  brothers 
and  sisters  are  often  tempted  to  have  as  their  aim  this, 
to  get  on,  and  that  is  quite  legitimate;  but  how  are  you 
getting  on?  Perhaps  the  temptation  is  to  say,  “I  want 
to  make  my  way  in  the  world.”  That  is  perfectly  right, 
but  is  it  the  way  of  righteousness?  Sometimes  the  aim 
is  to  get  wealthy.  Well,  that  is  all  right  too,  because  it 
is  a  good  thing  to  have  lots  of  money,  I  am  quite  sure, 
but  is  it  God’s  wealth  you  are  after,  or  is  it  wealth  for 
God  that  you  are  after?  Or  it  may  be  the  aim  is  to 
make  a  name  in  your  business,  in  your  profession.  That 
is  quite  right  too,  quite  legitimate,  but  is  it  a  name  for 
righteousness  ?  Low  aims  are  a  crime.  “If  ye  then  be 
risen  with  Christ,  aim  after  those  things  which  belong 
to  the  throne.”  See  that  you  do  not  aim  at  the  things 
that  belong  to  the  grave. 

Fifth  point,  light  on  the  ultimate  end  of  life,  you  still 
find  in  1  Peter  3:  18,  “For  Christ  also  hath  once  suffered 
for  sins,  the  just  for  the  unjust,  that  he  might  bring 
us  to  God,”  the  one  and  only  Master  of  life.  That  is 
the  final  cause  of  the  redemptive  work  of  Christ  through 
the  cross,  to  bring  us  to  God. 

The  old  creation  left  God  in  Eden,  and  ever  since 
God  has  been  seeking  for  a  new  creation.  Now  he  has 
a  new  head,  and  the  head  is  in  heaven  beside  himself, 
and  he  is  building  up,  building  up,  building  up  the  new 
creation.  And  when  the  Lord  appears  and  gathers  his 
Body  to  himself,  then  this  will  be  literally  true,  we  shall  be 
back  to  God  and  God  shall  get  back  to  himself  what  has 
always  been  his.  The  great  desire  of  his  heart,  the  ulti¬ 
mate  end  of  life  is  that  man  and  God  should  be  together. 

The  sixth  point  is  light  on  the  great  purpose  of  life, 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


71 


“Forasmuch  then  as  Christ  hath  suffered  for  us  in  the 
flesh,  arm  yourselves  likewise  with  the  same  mind:  for 
he  that  hath  suffered  in  the  flesh  hath  ceased  from  sin; 
that  he  no  longer  should  live  the  rest  of  his  time  in  the 
flesh  to  the  lusts  of  men,  but  to  the  will  of  God.”  There 
is  the  great  purpose  of  life,  and  Peter  says,  “Arm  your¬ 
selves,” — or  equip  yourselves — “with  the  same  mind,” 
that  is,  with  the  same  conception  of  the  purpose  of  life. 

The  word  “arm”  in  the  Greek  comes  from  a  word 
which  means  a  tool  which  was  used  in  offensive  warfare. 
Peter  tells  you  what  the  warfare  is  here,  sin  manifested 
through  the  lusts  of  the  flesh,  “For  he  that  hath  suffered 
in  the  flesh  hath  ceased  from  sin,  that  he  no  longer 
should  live  the  rest  of  his  time  in  the  flesh  to  the  lusts 
of  men.”  “The  flesh  lusteth  against  the  Spirit  and  the 
Spirit  lusteth  against  the  flesh,”  so  the  flesh  is  unceas¬ 
ing,  and  Satan  will  never  stop  his  efforts  to  break  you 
and  me  down  through  the  flesh. 

That  need  not  be  something  gross.  He  will  never 
stop  his  efforts  to  break  you  and  me  down  somehow  or 
other  through  the  flesh.  It  may  be  by  the  flesh  getting 
into  Christian  service,  service  being  done  in  fleshly 
energy  instead  of  in  the  power  of  the  Spirit.  Therefore 
the  apostle  bids  us  equip  ourselves  with  a  weapon  by 
which  we  can  defeat  the  devil  and  win  the  day. 

Notice  what  that  weapon  is.  It  is  just  a  right  con¬ 
ception  of  the  purpose  for  which  you  have  been  redeemed. 
What  is  that?  To  do  the  will  of  God.  Oh,  that  sums 
up  the  whole  Christian  life,  to  do  the  will  of  God.  You 
cannot  obey  two  wills  at  the  same  time.  You  cannot 
yield  to  two  opposing  forces.  If  you  do  the  will  of  God 
then  you  are  not  captured  by  the  will  of  the  flesh ;  but 
bear  in  mind  this,  the  flesh  will  only  yield  to  the  cross ; 
not  to  all  the  resolutions  you  may  make  at  a  conference, 
not  to  any  self-effort,  not  to  any  attempted  self-cruci¬ 
fixion,  only  to  co-crucifixion,  crucified  together  with  Christ. 
It  is  not  by  putting  yourself  to  death,  or  trying  to  put 
yourself  to  death,  but  by  taking,  by  faith  and  surrender. 


72 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


your  place  of  union  with  Christ  in  his  death.  That  is  the 
blessed  barrier  of  safety  between  you  and  all  the  attrac¬ 
tions  of  the  flesh,  and  that  makes  the  way  open  to  do  the 
will  of  God. 

What  is  life  for?  Just  what  it  was  for  Christ.  What 
was  it  for  Christ?  “I  came  down  from  heaven  to  do 
the  will  of  him  that  sent  me,”  and  all  through  life  he 
did  it,  in  childhood,  in  his  ministry,  in  the  shadow  of 
the  garden,  in  the  awful  shame  of  the  judgment  hall,  in 
the  darkness  of  the  cross,  from  the  beginning  to  end 
the  impelling,  constraining  motive  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  was  his  Father’s  will.  He  was  so  really  the  mas¬ 
ter  of  his  will  by  complete  surrender  of  his  spirit  to  his 
Father  that  he  could  take  that  will  of  his  and  put  it 
deliberately  and  definitely,  consistently  and  persistently, 
on  the  side  of  his  Father,  and  he  won  the  fight  through 
yieldedness.  And  the  same  must  be  true  of  us.  The 
cross  shows  that  to  do  the  will  of  God  is  to  make  the 
most  of  life. 

The  seventh  point  is,  the  cross  gives  us  light  beyond 
the  present:  “But  rejoice,  inasmuch  as  ye  are  partakers 
of  Christ’s  sufferings:  that,  when  his  glory  shall  be  re¬ 
vealed,  ye  may  be  glad  also  with  exceeding  joy”  (4:  13), 
light  beyond  the  present.  And  so  you  see  how  the  cross 
on  the  green  hill  links  the  to-day  of  time  with  the  to¬ 
morrow  of  eternity.  The  cross  proves  that  to  be  par¬ 
taker  of  the  sufferings  of  Christ  insures  partnership 
with  him  in  the  glory.  The  cross  tells  us  that  the  present 
is  not  all,  that  it  is  not  the  greatest.  It  lifts  our  eyes  to  the 
horizons  of  time  and  shows  us  that  they  are  beginning 
to  glow  with  a  glory  that  will  never  wane,  and  as  it  lifts 
our  eyes  it  tells  us  that  the  best  is  yet  to  be. 

No  life  can  ever  lose  that  links  itself  with  Christ  through 
the  cross ;  and  therefore  the  call  of  the  cross  as  it  is  illus¬ 
trated  in  the  epistles  by  Peter  is  essentially  practical.  It 
is  to  make  Christ  pre-eminent  in  us,  and  a  pre-eminent 
Christ  makes  pre-eminent  Christians. 


The  Cross  in  the  Epistles 


73 


“My  life,  my  love,  I  give  to  Thee, 

Thou  Lamb  of  God,  who  died  for  me ; 
O  may  I  ever  faithful  be, 

My  Saviour  and  my  God ! 

“O  Thou,  who  died  on  Calvary, 

To  save  my  soul  and  make  me  free, 

I  consecrate  my  life  to  Thee, 

My  Saviour  and  my  God!" 


VI 

THE  CROSS  IN  THE  REVELATION 

I  SHALL  not  attempt  an  exposition  of  the  Revelation ; 

that  is  not  my  purpose.  What  I  have  wished  to  do 
was  to  try  to  show  the  place  which  the  cross  has  in  the 
Word  of  God  and  to  suggest  lines  of  study  which  may  be 
helpful  and  joyous  and  profitable.  As  we  have  seen  some¬ 
thing  of  the  cross  in  the  Old  Testament,  and  in  the  Gos¬ 
pels  and  the  Epistles,  I  think  the  Holy  Spirit  would  seek 
to  make  us  see  the  place  of  the  cross  in  this  last  book  of 
the  Bible. 

It  is  the  book  of  the  future,  as  each* of  us  knows.  There 
are  two  lines  running  through,  of  brightness  and  blackness, 
of  conflict  and  conquest,  of  the  consummation  of  grace  in 
glory  and  the  consummation  of  sin  in  judgment;  but  the 
glory  prevails. 

The  book  begins  with  a  vision  of  the  ascended  Lord, 
the  ascended  victor,  and  ends  with  the  vision  of  the  re¬ 
deemed  state,  and  in  between  those  two  visions  you  have 
war  and  victory.  In  the  first  few  chapters  of  the  book  you 
hear  the  ringing  call  of  the  ascended,  conquering  Lord  to 
his  Church  to  overcome.  Then  there  is  heard  the  clash  of 
arms  and  the  story  of  Satanic  assault,  and  finally  the  Hal¬ 
lelujah  Chorus  of  the  victors  aronud  the  Lamb  in  eternal 
fellowship. 

The  center  of  the  book  is  the  Lamb,  the  keynote  of  the 
book  is  the  Lamb.  You  will  find  that  description  given 

74 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation 


75 


of  our  Lord  at  least  twenty-eight  times  in  the  book,  and 
in  the  rest  of  the  New  Testament  only  four  times.  It  is 
the  book  of  the  Lamb.  It  is  a  great  and  necessary  thing 
for  us  to  have  our  eyes  fixed  on  the  Lamb  and  to  see  him 
where  he  is.  While  we  cannot  but  be  conscious  of  the 
presence  of  the  enemy  and  the  powers  of  darkness  around 
us,  while  we  cannot  but  become  increasingly  conscious  of 
those  things  as  we  grow  in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of 
spiritual  things,  we  want  to  learn  to  look  at  them  all  from 
the  throne  and  see  that  behind  everything  that  is  happening 
in  the  world  to-day  the  Holy  Spirit,  without  any  break, 
without  any  failure,  is  leading  on  the  purpose  of  God  the 
Father  to  full  and  final  triumph. 

I  think  it  is  a  very  necessary  and  helpful  exercise  for 
Christians  to-day  to  read  again  and  again  this  book  of  the 
Revelation.  There  is  much  in  it  that  is  difficult  to  under¬ 
stand  and  explain,  but  the  general  plan  and  object  of  it 
are  quite  clear.  It  is  the  book  of  the  future,  and  being 
that,  it  throws  light  back  upon  the  pathway  of  earth  and 
it  shows  us  the  extraordinary,  close  connection  between 
the  cross  and  the  lives  of  redeemed  ones. 

As  we  read  this  book  and  see  what  the  life  is  to  be  in 
the  future  when  sin  is  done  away  with  and  Christ  is  all  in 
all,  the  book  shows  what  life  here  and  now  can  be  for  each 
one  of  us ;  and  the  secret  and  the  source  of  that  life,  from 
beginning  to  end,  is  the  cross,  the  Lamb  in  his  atoning 
sacrifice  on  the  tree. 

I  would  give  my  message  a  poetic  title,  calling  it, 
“Gleams  of  Glory  from  Calvary.”  And  as  you  read 
through  this  book  you  will  see  the  glory  gleams  flashing 
out  upon  you  on  every  side.  What  life  is  to  be  in  that 
wonderful  future  before  us  life  can  be  to-day  through  the 
power  of  the  cross.  That  is  the  message,  in  short,  of  this 
book  of  Revelation,  so  far  as  you  and  I  are  concerned. 
The  life  that  is  eternal  begins  here,  so  just  let  us  look 
repeatedly  at  this  book  and  see  what  that  life  is  and  what 
is  the  glory  that  shines  from  the  cross  upon  it. 

First,  turn  to  Revelation  1 :  5  and  read  the  text  that  we 


VI 

THE  CROSS  IN  THE  REVELATION 

I  SHALL  not  attempt  an  exposition  of  the  Revelation ; 

that  is  not  my  purpose.  What  I  have  wished  to  do 
was  to  try  to  show  the  place  which  the  cross  has  in  the 
Word  of  God  and  to  suggest  lines  of  study  which  may  be 
helpful  and  joyous  and  profitable.  As  we  have  seen  some¬ 
thing  of  the  cross  in  the  Old  Testament,  and  in  the  Gos¬ 
pels  and  the  Epistles,  I  think  the  Holy  Spirit  would  seek 
to  make  us  see  the  place  of  the  cross  in  this  last  book  of 
the  Bible. 

It  is  the  book  of  the  future,  as  each- of  us  knows.  There 
are  two  lines  running  through,  of  brightness  and  blackness, 
of  conflict  and  conquest,  of  the  consummation  of  grace  in 
glory  and  the  consummation  of  sin  in  judgment;  but  the 
glory  prevails. 

The  book  begins  with  a  vision  of  the  ascended  Lord, 
the  ascended  victor,  and  ends  with  the  vision  of  the  re¬ 
deemed  state,  and  in  between  those  two  visions  you  have 
war  and  victory.  In  the  first  few  chapters  of  the  book  you 
hear  the  ringing  call  of  the  ascended,  conquering  Lord  to 
his  Church  to  overcome.  Then  there  is  heard  the  clash  of 
arms  and  the  story  of  Satanic  assault,  and  finally  the  Hal¬ 
lelujah  Chorus  of  the  victors  aronud  the  Lamb  in  eternal 
fellowship. 

The  center  of  the  book  is  the  Lamb,  the  keynote  of  the 
book  is  the  Lamb.  You  will  find  that  description  given 

74 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation 


75 


of  our  Lord  at  least  twenty-eight  times  in  the  book,  and 
in  the  rest  of  the  New  Testament  only  four  times.  It  is 
the  book  of  the  Lamb.  It  is  a  great  and  necessary  thing 
for  us  to  have  our  eyes  fixed  on  the  Lamb  and  to  see  him 
where  he  is.  While  we  cannot  but  be  conscious  of  the 
presence  of  the  enemy  and  the  powers  of  darkness  around 
us,  while  we  cannot  but  become  increasingly  conscious  of 
those  things  as  we  grow  in  grace  and  in  the  knowledge  of 
spiritual  things,  we  want  to  learn  to  look  at  them  all  from 
the  throne  and  see  that  behind  everything  that  is  happening 
in  the  world  to-day  the  Holy  Spirit,  without  any  break, 
without  any  failure,  is  leading  on  the  purpose  of  God  the 
Father  to  full  and  final  triumph. 

I  think  it  is  a  very  necessary  and  helpful  exercise  for 
Christians  to-day  to  read  again  and  again  this  book  of  the 
Revelation.  There  is  much  in  it  that  is  difficult  to  under¬ 
stand  and  explain,  but  the  general  plan  and  object  of  it 
are  quite  clear.  It  is  the  book  of  the  future,  and  being 
that,  it  throws  light  back  upon  the  pathway  of  earth  and 
it  shows  us  the  extraordinary,  close  connection  between 
the  cross  and  the  lives  of  redeemed  ones. 

As  we  read  this  book  and  see  what  the  life  is  to  be  in 
the  future  when  sin  is  done  away  with  and  Christ  is  all  in 
all,  the  book  shows  what  life  here  and  now  can  be  for  each 
one  of  us ;  and  the  secret  and  the  source  of  that  life,  from 
beginning  to  end,  is  the  cross,  the  Lamb  in  his  atoning 
sacrifice  on  the  tree. 

I  would  give  my  message  a  poetic  title,  calling  it, 
“Gleams  of  Glory  from  Calvary.”  And  as  you  read 
through  this  book  you  will  see  the  glory  gleams  flashing 
out  upon  you  on  every  side.  What  life  is  to  be  in  that 
wonderful  future  before  us  life  can  be  to-day  through  the 
power  of  the  cross.  That  is  the  message,  in  short,  of  this 
book  of  Revelation,  so  far  as  you  and  I  are  concerned. 
The  life  that  is  eternal  begins  here,  so  just  let  us  look 
repeatedly  at  this  book  and  see  what  that  life  is  and  what 
is  the  glory  that  shines  from  the  cross  upon  it. 

First,  turn  to  Revelation  1 :  5  and  read  the  text  that  we 


76 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


have  already  read  more  than  once:  “Unto  him  that  loved 
us,  and  washed  us  from  our  sins  in  his  own  blood,  and  hath 
made  us  kings  and  priests  unto  God  and  His  Father;  to 
him  be  our  glory  and  dominion  for  ever  and  ever.  Amen.,, 
Read  it  as  we  have  it  in  the  Revised  Version,  “Unto  him 
that  loved  us  and  loosed  us  from  our  sins,  be  glory .”  See 
the  glory  of  the  delivered  life,  “unto  him  who  loved  us 
and  loosed  us.” 

The  first  message  of  the  cross  is  forgiveness ;  but  never 
let  us  forget  that  forgiveness  means  freedom  for  the  for¬ 
given  one.  Forgiveness  without  freedom  would  leave  us 
in  a  position  that  would  rob  the  forgiveness  of  its  sweet¬ 
ness  and  of  its  reality.  But  in  the  New  Testament  God's 
word  for  forgiveness  always  means  deliverance  from  the 
power  which  has  made  the  forgiveness  necessary. 

The  glory  of  the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
fulness  of  the  victory  which  he  has  won  on  Calvary,  and 
the  completeness,  the  perfection  of  the  salvation  which 
he  has  wrought  out  for  us  here  in  everyday  life. 

There  is  an  inscription  in  an  old  English  abbey  which 
perfectly  describes  the  delivered  life : 

“I  am  on  the  cross  for  thee, 

Thou  who  sinnest,  cease  from  sin. 

Cease;  I  pardon; 

Fight;  I  help; 

Conquer;  I  crown.” 

Now  that  is  the  life  that  is  free,  that  is  the  description  of 
the  life  that  is  free.  It  is  a  life  that  knows  pardon  for 
sin,  that  ceases  to  love  its  sin,  that,  in  co-operation  with 
the  Spirit  of  God,  through  the  victory  of  the  cross,  fights 
the  sin  and  never  gives  in ;  and  that,  conquering,  receives 
a  crown,  the  glory  of  the  freed  life. 

Let  us  turn  to  the  fifth  chapter  and  read  the  ninth 
verse:  “And  they  sung  a  new  song,  saying,  Thou  art 
worthy  to  take  the  book,  and  to  open  the  seals  thereof: 
for  thou  wast  slain,  and  hast  redeemed  us  to  God  by  thy 
blood  out  of  every  kindred,  and  tongue,  and  people,  and 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation 


77 


nation ;  and  hast  made  us  unto  our  God  kings  and  priests : 
and  we  shall  reign  on  the  earth.” 

This  exactly  follows  after  the  first,  it  is  the  glory  of  a 
changed  sphere.  This  new  song  is  the  result  of  a  new 
experience.  John  is  speaking  to  us  here  of  the  actual  con¬ 
dition,  I  take  it,  of  the  Church,  when  she  shall  be  trans¬ 
lated.  She  is  to  be  taken  out  of  the  natural  into  the 
heavenlies,  into  the  realm  where  the  heavenly,  is  to  be 
forever  supreme.  Is  not  that  the  experience  to-day  of 
all  who  come  to  the  cross  and  meet  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
in  grace?  We  become  new* creatures  in  Christ  Jesus,  we 
enter  into  a  new  sphere,  and  while  the  earthly  surround¬ 
ings  are  necessary,  there  is  something  of  the  heavenly 
that  has  come  into  us,  there  has  been  implanted  in  us  the 
life  principle  of  a  new  nature  which  has  on  it  the  mark 
of  the  spiritual  life  and  the  nature  of  God  himself.  Be¬ 
cause  redemption,  the  redemption  of  God  through  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  always  implies  that  we  become  par¬ 
takers  of  the  divine  nature. 

The  sphere  outwardly  is  not  changed.  That  is  coming, 
because  the  heart’s  true  home  is  the  throne  where  God 
is,  but  the  inward  change  has  already  begun,  thank  God. 
Redemption  through  the  cross  does  not  make  the  old 
nature  better,  it  introduces  a  new  nature,  belonging  to 
a  higher  order  of  beings,  and  a  changed  sphere  is  just  the 
life  that  is  born  of  the  Spirit  in  contradistinction  to  the 
life  that  is-  born  of  the  flesh.  And  when  that  life  comes 
to  the  birth  the  natural  thing  is  to  have  a  new  song,  even 
praise  unto  our  God. 

Third,  look  at  the  seventh  chapter  and  read  the  four¬ 
teenth  verse:  “And  I  said  unto  him,  Sir,  thou  knowest. 
And  he  said  to  me,  These  are  they  which  came  out  of 
great  tribulation,  and  have  washed  their  robes,  and  made 
them  white  in  the  blood  of  the  Lamb.” 

You  will  find  that  every  step  leads  on  to  another,  and 
here  you  have  the  glory  of  a  cleansed  character.  That 
is  the  necessary  result  of  a  delivered  life  and  a  new 
sphere,  a  cleansed  character.  Oh,  the  wondrous  work  of 


78 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


the  cross !  It  not  only  frees  us  from  the  old  sin  and  the 
old  man;  it  not  only  brings  us  into  a  new  sphere,  where 
we  have  a  new  principle  within  us,  and  a  new  spring  for 
our  lives,  but,  as  a  necessary  result,  it  deals  with  the 
character  in  order  to  set  the  character  right. 

O  beloved,  God’s  redemption  in  Christ  goes  to  the 
depths.  There  is  no  place  for  superficiality  in  God’s 
redemption.  The  cross  means  death  to  superficialities, 
the  cross  claims  death  in  our  lives,  the  working  of  the 
Spirit  of  God  right  into  the  very  depths  of  our  beings. 

What  is  character  but  just  the  source  of  everything 
that  relates  to  us;  and  we  are  what  our  characters  are. 
We  are  just  what  our  characters  are.  A  character  is 
God’s  workshop  where  divine  creations  take  form,  and 
they  go  out  bearing  his  mark  upon  them  to  witness  to  the 
world  of  his  skill  and  of  his  power. 

In  my  first  church  in  Scotland  I  had,  as  one  of  my 
members,  the  head  of  a  great  engineering  firm.  A  friend 
of  mine  once  said  of  that  engineering  firm,  “We  never 
question  their  prices.  Their  name  is  a  guarantee  of  their 
work.”  I  thought  it  was  a  magnificent  testimony  to  him. 
Is  His  mark  on  us  so  clear  that  the  people  of  the  world 
are  compelled  to  say  of  us  that  we  are  true  and  accept  us 
as  genuine? 

The  glory  of  a  cleansed  character  is  what  the  cross 
is  to  give  us.  No  wonder,  as  you  read  this  book,  that 
you  see  this ;  that  before  the  throne  there  is  to  be  given 
the  eternal  evidence  of  the  value  of  character  as  that  in 
which  the  power  of  the  Lord,  of  the  Lamb,  has  been  in 
operation  to  render  that  character  so  pure  that  it  can  stand 
in  the  presence  of1  God.  The  glory  of  the  cross  to-day 
is  its  power  to  transform  our  lives.  The  glory  of  the 
cross  in  eternity  will  be  seen  in  those  translated  to  the 
throne,  giving  forever  the  proof  of  the  cleansing  grace 
of  the  blood  of  the  Lamb.  They  have  washed  their  robes 
and  made  them  white  in  the  blood  of  the  Lamb. 

Notice  what  leads  us  on  from  a  cleansed  character,  in 
the  twelfth  chapter  and  the  eleventh  verse:  “They  over- 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation 


79 


came  him  (that  is,  the  accuser  mentioned  in  the  tenth 
verse)  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb,  and  by  the  word  of  their 
testimony ;  and  they  loved  not  their  lives  unto  the  death.” 
Now  there  comes  the  glory  of  the  perfect  victory.  Our 
lives  would  lack  some  of  their  richest  experience  if  vic¬ 
tory  were  not  possible,  such  a  victory  as  is  spoken  of 
here. 

In  the  gathering  of  the  heavenly  ones  around  the 
throne  there  will  be  seen  the  full  extent  of  that  victory 
won  on  the  cross,  and,  thank  God,  we  can  know  that  vic¬ 
tory  here,  and  we  can  know  it  in  growing  measure  just  as 
we  yield  our  lives  in  an  act  of  clear  surrender  to  Him  for 
a  life  of  real  honest  witnessing  and  service. 

There  is  nothing  within  the  circle  of  our  lives  that  may 
not  be  within  the  range  of  that  perfect  victory.  There 
is  no  weakness,  no  sin,  no  failure,  no  flaw  in  our  charac¬ 
ters  through  which  the  accuser  can  harass  us  that  cannot 
be  brought  under  the  power  of  this  precious  blood,  so 
that  that  blood  defeats  him  and  chokes  him  and  over¬ 
comes  him  and  drives  him  off  the  field.  I  do  not  believe 
there  is  one  single  thing  affecting  our  lives  in  relation  to 
God  and  his  service  where  we  may  not  know  absolute, 
complete  victory,  provided  the  cross  is  having  liberty 
in  our  lives  to  work  out  its  purpose.  As  soon  as  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  is  in  the  place  of  supremacy  and  we  are  in 
him,  then  logically,  through  infinite  grace,  we  too  are 
where  we  can  reign.  Therefore,  defeat  must  mean  slack¬ 
ness  on  our  part.  That  slackness  is  almost  always  found 
either  in  our  witness  or  in  our  surrender. 

What  is  the  witness  that  is  so  necessary  and  so  power¬ 
ful?  What  is  the  testimony  that  John  speaks  here? 
“They  overcame  him  by  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  and  by  the 
word  of  their  testimony.”  What  is  that?  Much  more 
than  merely  being  able  to  say,  “I  was  saved  twenty  years 
ago.”  Much  more  than  being  able  to  say,  “At  Stony 
Brook,  in  1922,  I  entered  into  the  real  fulness  of  bless¬ 
ing.”  It  is  a  testimony  against  the  enemy.  It  means 


80 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


recognizing  the  enemy  and  then  joining  the  Holy  Spirit 
in  his  judgment  upon  the  enemy. 

What  is  the  Holy  Spirit’s  judgment  upon  Satan  ?  That 
he  is  defeated.  Therefore,  giving  our  testimony  is  taking 
up  this  position  that  is  ours  in  Christ,  and  standing  there 
in  opposition  to  this  great  enemy  with  all  the  forces  which 
are  ours  through  the  cross,  and  through  the  Holy  Spirit, 
and  using  the  powers  which  God  has  given  us  to  resist 
him  and  to  overcome  him.  Remember  he  is  defeated. 
You  do  not  need  to  defeat  him ;  he  is  defeated,  he  was  de¬ 
feated  at  Calvary.  Never  fail  to  remind  him  of  it.  Give 
your  testimony  against  his  works,  give  your  testimony 
as  to  his  defeat,  and  as  to  the  certainty,  to  your  certainty, 
that  he  cannot  triumph.  Then,  in  the  name  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  you  can  command  him  to  go. 

That  power  is  yours  only  in  the  measure  in  which  you 
love  not  your  lives  unto  the  death.  That  power  to  bear 
testimony  against  the  enemy  and  to  bring  the  victory  of 
Calvary  into  actual  operation  in  your  own  experience 
depends  upon  the  reality  of  your  own  surrender  to  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  so  that  he  is  having  full  possession  of 
you  and  you  are  not  holding  back  anything. 

There  is  the  glory  of  perfect  victory  that  can  be  yours 
every  hour,  every  day,  right  on  until  the  Lord  comes. 
“They  overcame  him1  (the  accuser)  by  the  blood  of  the 
Lamb,”  and  he  will  never  stand  against  the  blood,  he  will 
never  stand  against  the  cross.  “They  overcame  him  by 
the  blood  of  the  Lamb,  and  by  the  word  of  their  testi¬ 
mony”  that  he  is  defeated,  and  therefore  has  no  right  to 
interfere  with  you.  “And  they  loved  not  their  lives  unto 
the  death.” 

Pass  on  to  the  fourteenth  chapter  and  the  fourth  verse, 
the  middle  clause  of  that  verse,  “These  are  they  which 
follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goeth.”  Now,  if  the 
Lord  has  won  for  you  and  for  me  a  perfect  victory,  look 
what  he  is  expecting  of  us  and  what  he  has  a  right  to 
claim  (fifth),  the  glory  of  unreserved  consecration.  “They 
follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goeth.”  There  is 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation  81 

nothing  which  proves  the  meaning  of  the  cross  more 
clearly  than  such  a  consecration  as  that.  There  is  nothing 
which  sheds  a  brighter  glory  on  the  redeeming  sacrifice 
of  the  Lamb  than  that.  There  is  nothing  which  gives  to 
us  greater  strength  and  purer  joy,  and  fuller  power  for 
holy  living  than  such  an  unobserved  and  unhesitating 
following  of  the  Lamb  as  is  spoken  of  in  that  verse. 

And  does  he  not  call  for  that  because  of  his  need  of  us 
as  witnesses  in  the  world  ?  Has  he  not  a-  right  to  ask  that 
from  us  because  of  his  surrender  at  Calvary?  Does  the 
world  see  you  and  me  in  such  a  consecration  as  that  ?  Do 
you  ever  stand  still  during  the  day  and  ask  this  question 
of  yourself,  “What  am  I  known  as  among  the  angels 
around  the  throne  ?”  “These  follow  the  Lamb/’  John 
saw  them  from  the  viewpoint  of  the  throne,  as  they 
were  on  earth,  and  this  is  the  testimony  of  heaven  to 
them  when  they  were  on  earth,  “They  followed  the  Lamb 
whithersoever  He  went.” 

What  are  we  known  as  among  the  angels  in  heaven? 
Do  they  look  down  upon  us  and  say,  “These  are  follow¬ 
ing  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goes”?  Our  consecration 
is  a  test  and  a  proof  of  our  discipleship. 

Let  us  turn  to  the  seventeenth  chapter,  the  fourteenth 
verse,  “These  shall  make  war  with  the  Lamb,  and  the 
Lamb  shall  overcome  them }  for  He  is  Lord  of  lords  and 
King  of  Kings!”  Now  notice  this  next  sentence,  “And 
they  that  are  with  him  [they  that  follow  Him  whitherso¬ 
ever  He  goes]  are  called,  and  chosen,  and  faithful.”  There 
is  the  sixth  flash  of  glory  from  the  cross,,  the  glory  of  serv¬ 
iceableness,  the  glory  of  being  serviceable.  Calvary  alone 
can  effect  that. 

Natural  gifts  are  a  wonderful  possession  and  they 
effect  many  results,  but  divine  grace  always  lifts  service 
on  to  a  higher  level ;  and  you  will  notice  it  is  only  the 
message  of  the  cross  that  can  call  us  out  of  darkness  and 
out  of  death.  It  is  only  as  we  are  yielded  to  the  spirit 
of  that  matchless  sacrifice  on  Calvary  that  there  can  be 
produced  in  us  joyous  souls.  It  is  only  the  power  of  the 


82 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


death  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  working  in  us,  that  can 
make  us  faithful  in  these  perilous  days.  Our  serviceable¬ 
ness  is  measured  by  the  depth  of  the  Calvary  spirit  within 
us.  Our  ability  to  be  used  by  God  is  measured  by  the 
depth  of  the  spirit  of  Calvary  within  us,  and  it  is  that 
spirit  which  makes  the  life  radiant  for  God. 

Look  at  the  nineteenth  chapter,  the  ninth  verse:  “And 
he  saith  unto  me,  Write,  Blessed  are  they  which  are 
called  unto  the  marriage  supper  of  the  Lamb.”  There  is 
the  seventh  gleam  of  glory,  it  is  the  glory  of  fellowship. 
There  we  have  the  record  of  the  eternal  fellowship,  the 
unending  marriage  banquet  of  the  Lamb  at  which  the 
redeemed  will  one  day  sit.  And  what  have  you  there  but 
the  picture  of  what  personal  fellowship  with  Christ  can 
be. 

First  Corinthians  1 : 9  says,  “Called  unto  the  fellowship 
of  his  Son  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord.”  That  is  the  normal 
experience  of  the  child  of  God.  That  is  not  something 
for  people  especially  gifted,  especially  holy.  That  is  the 
privilege  of  every  child  of  God.  We  are  redeemed  for 
that.  The  cross  has  made  that  possible.  The  cross  calls 
us  into  that  fellowship.  The  cross  makes  us  fit  for  it, 
and  just  as  the  purpose  of  the  cross  is  effected  in  our 
daily  lives  can  that  fellowship  grow  full  and  real  and 
useful. 

Do  not  let  us  forget  that  fellowship  with  Christ  is  not 
a  selfish  thing.  Fellowship  with  Christ  means  getting 
into  sympathy  with-  Christ  in  his  outlook  upon  the  world. 
Are  we  there?  “Love  so  amazing,  so  divine” — what  are 
we  going  to  say?  I  do  not  like  the  word  “demands.”  I 
like  the  word  “shall  have.”  It  is  true  that  it  demands  all, 
but  can  we  say  “shall  have”? — “shall  have  my  life,  my 
soul,  my  all!” 

Do  not  let  us  seek  or  speak  of  the  death  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  unless  he  who  died  that  death  for  our 
redemption  is  seeing  in  and  through  us  to  the  uttermost 
ends  of  the  earth  the  travail  of  his  soul.  That  is  fellow¬ 
ship  with  Christ. 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation 


83 


Now  we  come  to  the  last,  the  twenty-second  chapter, 
the  first  verse :  “And  he  showed  me  a  pure  river  of  water 
of  life,  clear  as  crystal,  proceeding  out  of  the  throne  of 
God  and  of  the  Lamb.”  There  is  the  eighth  gleam  of 
glory,  it  is  the  glory  of  a  true  government. 

Christ  is  not  yet  on  His  throne  (3:21).  He  is  seated 
on  his  Father’s  throne,  and  they  are  quite  distinct.  In 
5  :6  he  is  not  yet  on  the  throne,  he  is  standing  in  the 
midst  of  the  throne.  In  7:10,  it  is  God  who  is  on  the 
throne.  Then  we  come  to  20:11,  and  we  see  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  at  last,  on  the  throne,  a  throne  of  judgment. 
That  brings  an  end  to  sin  and  to  rebellion.  Then  in  this 
first  verse  of  the  twenty-second  chapter  we  see  one 
throne,  the  throne  of  God  and  of  the  Lamb.  The  Father 
and  the  Son  are  united  again  on  one  throne,  because  the 
work  for  which  the  Father  gave  his  Son,  and  the  work 
for  which  the  Son  left  his  Father  and  shed  his  blood,  is 
done. 

Now  the  Holy  Spirit,  the  pure  river  of  life,  is  proceed¬ 
ing  out  of  the  throne  of  God  and  of  the  Lamb  to  heal  the 
nations  by  means  of  the  leaves  of  the  tree  of  life,  to  give 
to  them  perfect  government,  to  give  to  them  what  no 
man  or  men  are  big  enough  to-day  to  give  to  the  world, 
stability  of  government,  righteousness  of  government, 
peace,  and  everything  else  for  which  the  world  is  long¬ 
ing.  When  that  day  of  true,  perfect  government  comes, 
you  will  see  that  earthly  things,  material  things,  are  of  no 
further  use.  “They  need  no  candle,  neither  light  of  the 
sun ;  for  the  Lord  God  giveth  them  light,”  and  in  the  end¬ 
less  eternity  you  and  I  and  all  that  marvelous  company 
of  the  redeemed  ones  will  begin  to  understand  something 
of  the  meaning  of  the  cross  and  the  value  of  the  death 
of  the  Son  of  God.  We  shall  begin  to  see  something  of 
the  glory  of  that  wonderful  sacrifice,  and  in  that  glory 
we  shall  live  our  lives,  for  we  shall  reign  forever  and 
ever. 

The  secret  of  all  this  wonderful  life  that  is  pictured 
for  us  in  this  book,  thrown  back  upon  us  from  the  light 


84 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


of  eternity,  is  this:  taking,  and  keeping  by  the  power  of 
the  Holy  Spirit,  our  place  of  death  union  with  Christ. 
Some  may  not  understand  the  meaning  of  that,  but  if  we 
ask  the  Holy  Spirit  to  lead  us  into  the  meaning  of  it  he 
will  do  it.  It  is  something  we  can  understand  only  by 
experience.  When  we  yield  to  the  Holy  Spirit  and  ask 
him  to  make  the  death  of  Christ  in  its  fullest  purpose 
known  to  us,  he  will  lead  us  into  it.  That  is  the  secret 
of  life.  It  is  taking  our  place  with  Christ  on  the  cross 
to  everything  that  is  opposing  the  Father’s  will,  and 
maintaining  that  attitude  of  death  as  these  things  come 
into  our  lives.  * 

That  death  position  in  and  through  Christ  is  the  posi¬ 
tion  from  which  we  draw  strength  and  victory  and  life. 

I  do  trust  that  through  these  very  imperfect,  feeble 
messages,  some  at  least  have  seen  the  place  which  the 
cross  has  in  the  Bible,  in  the  eye  of  God,  in  the  plan  of 
God,  and  if  you  have  caught  something  of  a  vision  of 
Calvary,  go  to  your  Church,  and  to  your  home,  and  to 
your  business,  and  to  your  Sunday-school  class,  and  as 
never  before  lift  up  the  standard  of  the  cross,  and  focus 
the  eye  of  people  to-day  on  the  cross.  It  is  necessary  to 
everything,  it  is  the  source  of  all  power. 

You  never  can  get  away  from  the  cross.  If  you  are 
going  to  live  the  victorious  life,  if  you  are  going  to  know 
the  resurrection  power  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  you  never  can 
get  away  from  the  cross.  Hereafter  you  will  never  want 
to  get  away  from  it,  for  “The  Lamb  is  all  the  glory  in 
Emmanuel’s  Land.” 

Prayer 

O  God ,  may  there  he  nothing  in  us  to  hinder  the  glory 
of  the  cross  from  flashing  in  upon  our  hearts  and  lives. 
O  help  us,  by  Thy  grace,  so  to  yield  to  the  Holy  Spirit 
that  he  will  be  able  to  work  into  us  all  the  purpose  and 
all  the  death  of  Christ;  that  nothing  in]  us  may  hinder  the 
glory  flashing  out  upon  this  poor  world,  this  world  that 
is  rushing  about  in  its  madness  and  despair,  crying, 
“Where  is  thy  balm?” 


The  Cross  in  the  Revelation 


85 


Out  of  our  broken  lives,  out  of  our  lives  broken  up  by 
the  Holy  Spirit,  may  the  glory  flash,  that  some  poor 
darkened,  wandering,  despairing,  hungry  soul  roundabout 
us  may  see  the  glory  and  may  see  that  it  is  the  glory  of 
the  Lamb  who  died  for  him. 

Continue  thy  presence  with  us,  and  bless  us  and  guard 
us,  in  Jesus’  Name.  Amen. 


VII 


THE  MOLD  OF  THE  CROSS 
HE  subject  I  want  to  discuss  in  this  message  is,  “The 


X  Molding  Power  of  the  Cross/’  and  I  shall  begin  at 
Philippians  3:10,  the  last  clause  of  that  verse,  which  I 
shall  quote  from  the  translation  by  Conybeare,  “Sharing 
the  likeness  of  his  death.”  Our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  has 
just  one  mold  for  producing  Christian  character,  and-  that 
is  the  cross.  You  and  I  cannot  reach  our  goal  except  in 
the  way  in  which  he  reached  his  goal,  and  the  cross  is 
the  mold  through  which  he  puts  each  one  who  is  to 
represent  him  here  and  who  is  to  reign  with  him  hereafter. 

For  the  cross  is  the  only  place  where  we  get  rid  of  dead 
things  that  hinder  us  and  hinder  him,  and  the  place  where 
we  enter  into  a  deep  and  an  ever  deeper  conformity  with 
him,  sharing  in  the  likeness  of  his  death,  having  his  image 
impressed  upon  our  character. 

When  I  use  the  word  “mold”  let  there  be  no  mistake. 
I  do  not  mean  that  each  one  of  us  becomes  the  facsimile  of 
every  other  one.  There  is  this  which  differentiates  the 
mold  of  the  cross  from  every  earthly  mold,  that  while  the 
cross  is  the  only  mold  which  he  uses,  it  has  no  stereotyped 
pattern.  Our  Lord  never  trespasses  against  the  law  of 
personality.  Just  as  you  will  not  find  two  members  of 
the  same  family  exactly  alike,  or  two  blades  of  grass  in 
the  same  plot  similar,  so  in  the  new  creation  the  cross  does 
not  produce  a  monotony  of  spiritual  character,  which 


86 


The  Mold  of  the  Cross 


87 


would  make  the  world  an  intolerable  place  in  which  to 
live,  but  a  variety  of  natures,  each  bearing  its  own  mark 
of  individuality,  and  all  of  them  together  revealing  the 
marvelous  manifoldness  of  the  divine  mind  and  the  divine 
spirit. 

How  the  mold  of  the  cross  works  is  this:  God  has 
taken  the  old  creation  and  he  has  condemned  it  in  Christ, 
and  he  is  now  at  work  on  a  new  creation.  There  is  no 
place  in  the  plan  of  God  for  the  betterment  of  the  old 
creation.  He  does  not  bring  about  some  kind  of  trans¬ 
formation  of  the  old  man*  so  as  to  produce  some  kind  of 
resemblance  to  Christ  in  Christian  character  and  conduct. 
There  is  only  one  place  for  the  old  creation,  and  that  is 
the  cross.  But  it  is  not  enough  for  us  to  say  it  is  there 
crucified  with  Christ.  Crucifixion  was  a  lingering  death, 
and  while  we  stand  once  and  for  all  upon  the  fact  of 
God,  which  is  eternal  and  unchangeable,  that  when  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  went  to  the  cross  he  took  more  than 
our  sins  with  him ;  he  took  our  old  man  and  dealt  with 
the  source  of  all  our  sin,  and  dealt  with  it  satisfactorily; 
while  we  stand  on  that  fact,  there  has  to  be  the  daily 
working  out  of  the  victory  which-  Christ  has  won  for  us ; 
there  has  to  be  the  daily  dying  to  this  old  self.  The  Holy 
Spirit  has  to  work  into  us  the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  in  all  its  wonderful  power  and  purpose. 

In  1  Corinthians  15:31  the  apostle  says,  “I  protest  by 
your  rejoicing,  which  I  have  in  Christ  Jesus  our  Lord, 
I  die  daily”;  and  2  Corinthians  4:11,  “For  we  which  live 
are  alway  delivered  unto  death  for  Jesus’  sake,  that  the 
life  also  of  Jesus  might  be  made  manifest  in  our  mortal 
flesh.”  There  has  to  be  the  daily  dying,  the  daily  work¬ 
ing  out  in  our  own  lives  of  the  victory  won  for  us  on 
Calvary. 

I  was  walking  with  a  friend  in  the  grounds  around  his 
house,  and  I  noticed  a  very  notable  tree,  a  labumum*tree. 
It  is  very  beautiful,  with  long,  drooping  branches  covered 
with  d  yellow  bloom.  In  Germany  it  is  called  the  Golden 
Ray,  and  it  is  just  like  that,  like  cascades  of  golden  rays. 


90 


TiiE  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


same  conflict  which  ye  saw  in  me,  and  now  hear  to  be  in 
me/’  There  the  Holy  Spirit,  through  Paul,  makes  very 
clear  the  connection  between  this  co-passion  and  blessing. 
In  2  Corinthians  1 :5,  we  are  told,  “For  as  the  sufferings 
of  Christ  abound  in  us,  so  our  consolation  also  aboundeth 
by  Christ.  And  whether  we  be  afflicted,  it  is  for  your 
consolation  and  salvation,  which  is  effectual  -  in  the 
enduring  of  the  same  sufferings  which- we  also  suffer:  or 
whether  we  be  comforted,  it  is  for  your  consolation  and 
salvation.  And  our  hope  of  you  is  steadfast,  knowing  that 
as  ye  are  partakers  of  the  sufferings,  so  shall  ye  be  also 
of  the  consolation.” 

Partaking  with  Christ  in  the  sufferings  of  the  cross  is 
the  way  into  the  partnership  with  Christ  in  everything 
that  he  has  to  give  us.  So  let  me  try  to  put  the  mold  of 
the  cross  into  something  of  a  practical  form.  Every  time 
we  die  to  sin, /every  time  we  die  to  the  temptation  of 
temper,  or  to  the  sin  of  the  irritating  word,  or  to  the 
tendency  to  worry,  or  to  the  meanness  and  the  trickery 
and  the  unrighteousness  and  the  corruption  of  the  old 
nature,  every  time  we  die  to  the  spirit  of  retaliation  or 
to  the  desire  for  self-vindication,  or  to  what  seems  to  us 
a  perfectly  legitimate  self-defense,  every  time  we  follow 
in  the  steps  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  and  allow  what  is 
against  us  to  take  us  deeper  down  into  the  death  union 
with  him ;  every  time  we  enter  deliberately  into  this  co¬ 
passion  with  Christ  and  allow  what  has  caused  failure  in 
our  lives  to  make  more  real  to  us  the  necessity  and  mean¬ 
ing  of  his  death ;  every  time  we  act  in  that  way  we  are 
putting  ourselves  into  the  mold  of  the  cross,  and  we  are 
giving  the  Holy  Spirit  the  opportunity  to  impress  the 
character,  the  image  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  upon  our- 
character.  And  it  is  that  that  is  going  to  get  to  the  con¬ 
science  and  heart  of  the  world.  The  Christian  who  is 
going  to  do  God’s  work  to-day  in  the  world  must  be  a 
cross-molded  Christian. 

To  make  the  mold  effective  I  do  not  forget  this — the 
constant  fellowship  that  Christ  has  with  us.  Let  us  read 


The  Mold  of  the  Cross 


91 


Hebrews  2:18,  “For  in  that  he  himself  hath  suffered 
being  tested,  he  is  able  to  succour  them  that  are  tested.” 
Let  us  never  forget  this.  If  we  do  not  fail  to  enter  into 
the  co-passion,  Christ  will  never  fail  in  compassion. 
“Being  tested,  he  is  able  to  succour  them  that  are  tested.” 
He  will  never  let  us  go  alone;  and  whether  he  keeps  you 
in  America  or  takes  you  to  China  or  to  the  uttermost  ends 
of  the  earth,  he  will  never  let  you  go  alone.  The  way  is 
too  rough  for  you  and  me  to  be  allowed  to  go  alone,  and 
oh,  the  compassion  of  the  living  Christ  for  the  members 
of  his  Body !  Through  the  mold  of  the  cross  he  is  always 
going  by  his  own  Holy  Spirit,  and  every  time  you  and  I 
go  into  that  mold  and  allow  the  Holy  Spirit  to  work  into 
us  the  pattern  of  his  character  we  are  filling  up,  like  Paul, 
the  sufferings  of  Christ,  making  the  joy  of  the  Lord 
more  real  and  more  full. 

I  beg  you  to  remember  that  that  is  what  we  are  called 
to  (1  Cor.  1:9),  “Ye  were  called  unto  The  fellowship  of 
his  Son.”  We  are  called  into  such  a  fellowship  as  that, 
a  co-passion  with  Christ  like  that.  We  cannot  avoid  it, 
if  we  are  to  be  true  to  Him.  We  are  called  to  be  par¬ 
takers  of  the  cross,  if  we  are  to  be  partners  in  the  crown. 

It  will  always  be  the  endeavor  of  Satan  to  make  you 
and  me  shirk  the  cross,  to  keep  us  from  the  cross,  to  make 
us  shirk  the  painful  element  in  witnessing,  to  shirk  the 
act  of  sacrifice,  to  refuse  the  position  that  will  prove  in¬ 
convenient  and  to  choose  another  position  that  seems  to 
be  less  inconvenient.  That  is  the  constant  temptation  of 
the  enemy,  the  same  temptation  to  us  that  was  hurled  in 
the  face  of  the  Lord  Jesus  upon  the  cross,  “Save  thyself, 
and  come  down  from  the  cross.”  That  is  still  the  bait  by 
which  the  devil  seeks  to  lure  us  away  from  the  path  of 
the  cross ;  it  is  the  challenge  that  he  is  continually  flaunt¬ 
ing  in  our  faces.  But  we  dare  not  claim  the  benefits  of 
the  redemption  of  Christ  unless  we  are  prepared  to  accept 
the  redemption  position. 

Satan  never  drove  Christ  to  the  cross.  You  have 
noticed  in  the  Gospels  how,  by  every  possible  means  in  his 


92 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


power,  he  tried  to  keep  him  from  that  .moment.  He  in¬ 
stigated  Herod  to  kill  all  the  little  children  in  Bethlehem 
and  its  vicinity,  in  the  hopes  that  he  might  get  rid  of  the 
holy  child,  Jesus.  All  through  the  ministry  of  the  Lord, 
if  you  look  you  can  see  the  track  of  Satan.  It  is  said  if 
the  devil  left  him  for  a  season  it  was  a  very  short  season. 
There  was  almost  never  a  moment  after  that  temptation 
that  the  devil  left  him  alone.  He  tried  to  drive  him  over 
the  brow  of  the  hill,  tried  to  stone  him,  tried  to  drown 
him,  tried  to  force  him  upon  the  throne  when  the  people 
were  aroused  by  the  miracle  of  the  loaves  and  fishes.  I 
believe  he  tried  to  kill  him  in  the  garden,  and  when  he 
could  not  do  that  and  found  that  Christ  was  bound  to 
fulfill  the  purpose  for  which  he  had  come  to  the  earth, 
which  was  to  go  to  the  cross,  he  heaped  insult  upon  insult 
upon  the  Son  of  God  and  tried  to  brand  with  the  mark  of 
shame  what  God  meant  to  be  the  instrument  of  victory. 

You  and  I  will  find,  there  is  no  use  of  hiding  it  from 
ourselves,  perhaps  more  than  ever,  that  the  offense  of  the 
cross  has  not  ceased,  and  upon  those  who  stand^for  the 
cross,  and  who  follow  the  cross,  the  hatred  of  Satan  will 
be  concentrated  just  as  it  was  upon  the  Master.  “Save 
thyself,  and  come  down  from  the  cross,”  that  will  be  the 
temptation  to  you,  my  dear  young  man  and  woman,  as  you 
go  back  into  Christian  work,  and  as  you  go  out  into  the 
mission  field.  That  will  be  the  continuous  temptation  that 
will  be  leveled  against  you,  “Save  yourself.  Shirk  that 
little  bit  of  work.  It  is  too  painful,  it  is  going  to  cost  too 
much.  Forget  it.  You  will  get  on  all  right.  Shirk  it, 
save  thyself,  and  come  down  from  the  cross.”  But  if  you 
and  I  are  ever  to  know  the  deeps  of  God’s  grace,  if  your 
lives  and  mine  are  ever  to  be  raised  to  the  level  on  which 
God  means  them  to  be,  in  order  to  touch  the  conscience  of 
that  world  outside,  it  will  only  be  as  you  and  I  are  willing 
to  go  into  the  mold  of  the  cross,  cost  what  it  may,  and 
yield  ourselves  to  the  power  and  purpose  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  And  the  question  is,  are  we  willing  to  go  on? 

The  cross  is  just  the  gathering  point  for  the  children 


The  Mold  of  the  Cross 


93 


of  God.  It  is  the  fixed  point  where  the  children  of  God 
can  always  find  the  most  perfect  assurance  of  safety  and 
the  most  continuous  spring  of  power,  the  cross.  Without 
the  cross  as  a  mighty  factor  in  your  life  and  in  mine,  we 
should  never  reach  the  divinely  revealed  goal,  we  would 
be  imperfect. 

Therefore  the  call  of  the  cross  is  to  enter  into  this 
passion  of  Christ.  We  must  have  upon  us  the  print  of 
the  nails.  We  hear  the  people  of  the  world  saying  to  us 
children  of  God  to-day,  “Except  I  see  the  print  of  the 
nails  in  you  I  will  not  believe.”  We  must  have  on  us  the 
print  of  the  nails ;  we  must  share  in  the  likeness  of  his 
death  and  have  formed  in  our  characters  the  pattern  of 
Jesus. 

What  is  it  going  to  mean?  It  is  not  going  to  be  for 
you  what  the  world  would  have  you  believe  it  is  going  to 
be.  It  is  not  going  to  be  for  you  what  many  Christians 
fear  it  will  mean,  the  gloomy  side  of  life  uppermost,  an 
experience  of  loss,  a  harvest  of  pain  and  suffering,  and 
the  repression  of  all  the  natural  gifts  with  which  God 
has  endowed  us.  It  is  not  going  to  mean  that.  What  is 
it  going  to  mean?  Let  us  listen  to  the  man  who  poured 
himself  into  the  mold  of  the  cross,  as  he  tells  us  what  it 
is  to  mean  for  you  and  for  me.  In  the  translation  of 
Conybeare,  Romans  6:5  reads:  “For  if  we  have  been 
grafted  into  the  likeness  of  his  death,  so  shall  we  also  share 
his  resurrection.” 

Let  me  say  that  we  do  not  need  to  be  careful  not  to 
emphasize  a  truth  out  of  right  proportion ;  not  to  preach 
what  I  have  been  calling  the  death  side  of  the  cross  so  as 
to  forget  the  life  side  of  the  cross,  but  never  to  emphasize 
the  resurrection  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  so  as  to  lose 
sight  of  the  cross.  That  is  what  many,  I  fear,  are  doing 
to-day,  forgetting  that  the  constant  reassertion  of  the  self- 
life  can  be  dealt  with  only  by  the  cross,  and  can  be  kept 
under  only  by  the  Holy  Spirit  through  the  cross ;  and  that 
only  in  the  measure  in  which  we  enter  into  the  death  union 
with  Christ  can  we  know  the  resurrection  life  of  Christ. 


94 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


Look  at  an  oak.  It  has  been  standing  for  hundreds  of 
years.  How  was  it  born?  In  a  grave.  The  acorn  died 
and  disappeared,  and  it  sent  its  roots  down  and  its  shoots 
up,  and  it  has  grown  big  and  strong,  with  its  roots  con¬ 
stantly  in  the  grave,  and  all  its  strength,  its  beauty,  its 
foliage  and  everything  else  it  owes  to  the  grave.  Every¬ 
thing  that  you  and  I  can  have  we  owe  to  the  death  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ.  And  the  resurrection  is  the  flower 
that  springs  out  of  the  tomb,  and  if  we  share  in  the  death 
of  Christ,  the  very  first  thing  that  comes  to  us  is  sharing 
in  the  resurrection. 

Look  at  the  sixth  chapter  of  Romans,  the  eighth  verse: 
"‘Now  if  we  have  shared  the  death  of  Christ,  we  believe 
that  we  shall  also  share  his  life,”  life  over  which  death 
can  have  no  dominion,  a  power  that  nothing  in  the  world 
can  destroy,  a  hope  of  which  nothing  can  rob  us. 

I  want  to  quote  some  lines  by  an  old  mystic,  written  in 
1277  along  the  line  of  this  truth,  which  shows  what  a 
wonderful  thing  it  is  to  share  in  the  death  and  the  resur¬ 
rection  life  of  the  Son  of  God : 

“The  loathing  of  thy  sin  thy  cross  shall  be, 

Thy  crucifix  the  crossing  of  thy  will, 

The  nails  thine  obedience  that  shall  fasten  thee ; 

And  love  shall  wound  and  steadfastness  shall  slay, 

Yet  thou  shalt  love  me  still. 

The  spear  shall  pierce  thy  heart,  my  life  shall  be 
The  life  that  lives  and  moves  henceforth  in  thee, 

Then,  as  a  conqueror,  loosened  from  the  cross, 

Laid  in  a  grave  of  nothingness  and  loss, 

Thou  shalt  awaken  and  be  borne  above 
Upon  the  breath  of  mine  almighty  love.” 

Look  at  Romans  8:17,  “If  now  we  share  his  sufferings, 
we  shall  hereafter  share  his  glory,”  and  Ephesians  2:6, 
“Seated  in  heavenly  places  in  Christ.”  We  share  his  seat 
in  the  heavenlies  to-day  in  the  place  of  victory.  Revela¬ 
tion  3  :21  shows  we  are  going  to  share  his  throne.  And 
will  you  notice  in  those  letters  to  the  churches,  the  greatest 
of  all  the  promises  is  made  to  the  one  who  overcomes  in 
the  church  of  Laodicea,  because  there  is  no  atmosphere 


The  Mold  of  the  Cross 


95 


so  difficult  for  a  man  to  witness  in,  to  overcome  in,  as  the 
atmosphere  of  the  church  of  Laodicea,  the  church  of  the 
present  day.  And  the  overcomer  is  going  to  share  in  His 
throne. 

In  Philippians  1 : 7,  '‘You  all  share,”  says  Paul,  “in  the 
grace  bestowed  upon  me.”  That  is  the  power  for  confirm¬ 
ing  the  truth  of  the  Gospel  by  our  sufferings,  our  co¬ 
passion  with  Christ,  and  this  co-passion  with  Christ  will 
mean  strength  for  the  day,  the  accomplishment  of  life’s 
purposes,  giving  to  the  world  the  testimony  of  the  power 
of  a  living  Christ,  victory  that  is  full  and  complete. 
Therefore  let  me  read  my  last  passage  in  2  Corinthians 
4:7-10,  Conybeare’s  translation:  “But  this  treasure  is 
lodged  in  a  body  of  fragile  clay ;  that  so  the  surpassing 
might  which  accompanies  the  work  shall  be  God’s  and 
not  mine.  I  am  hard  pressed,  yet  not  crushed ;  perplexed, 
yet  not  despairing;  persecuted,  yet  not  forsaken;  struck 
down,  yet  not  destroyed.  In  my  body  I  bear  about  con¬ 
tinually  the  dying  of  Jesus,  that  in  my  body  the  life  also 
of  Jesus  might  be  shown  forth.” 

Do  you  not  see  the  picture?  Every  time  you  are  hard 
pressed  in  that  field  of  yours  and  yet  not  crushed ;  per¬ 
plexed,  and  yet  not  despairing ;  persecuted,  and  yet  realiz¬ 
ing  that  you  are  not  forsaken ;  struck  down,  and  yet  not 
destroyed ;  you  are  winning  the  victory,  you  are  living  the 
victorious  Christian  life. 

Some  people  seem  to  think  that  the  victorious  Christian 
life  can  only  be  lived  when  you  are  on  the  crest  of  the 
wave.  You  are  sometimes  most  victorious  when  you  are 
being  submerged  and  coming  up  again  with  a  smile  on 
your  face  and  with  trust  in  your  heart — perplexed,  not 
despairing;  pressed  down,  not  crushed.  Every  time  you 
are  that  you  are  putting  yourself  into  the  mold  of  the 
cross ;  the  cross  is  doing  its  work,  and  the  proof  is  being 
given  that  Christ  is  in  you,  and  the  life  of  Jesus  is  being 
shown  forth. 

Oh,  there  is  nothing  that  the  church  of  God  requires 
more  to-day  than  men  and  women  in  whom  the  Holy 


96 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


Spirit  is  being  allowed  to  do  all  his  work.  The  church 
is  suffering  to-day  from  unmolded  Christians,  Christians 
who  say  they  are  his  and  do  not  look  like  it  in  the  eye  of 
the  world.  What  the  world  is  hungering  for  is  men  and 
women  in  whom  they  can  see  Christ  and  from  whom  they 
can  receive  the  hope  that  they  too  can  find  Christ  and 
know  the  power  of  his  resurrection  and  triumph  over  sin 
and  Satan,  and  over  death  and  hell.  What  the  world 
needs  is  cross-molded  Christians.  Will  you  and  I  be 
of  them? 


VIII 


THE  IMPERATIVES  OF  THE  CROSS 

IT  IS  very  remarkable  how  clearly  and  unhesitatingly  the 
Word  of  God  emphasizes  the  imperatives  of  the  cross 
and  the  obligations  resulting  from  the  cross.  And  yet 
that  is  just  what  we  might  expect.  The  imperative  note 
of  the  Word  of  God  is  clearly  and  distinctly  sounded  as 
it  summons  the  believer  to  a  walk  of  truth  and  of 
obedience.  For  this  reason  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  did  not 
come  to  the  cross  for  a  mere  ideal,  but  to  meet  a  tre¬ 
mendous,  actual  need  and  to  lead  every  one  who  should 
believe  in  him  and  who  should  yield  to  him  into  an 
experience  of  the  most  practical  nature  of  what  Christian 
living  and  Christian  serving  really  means.  I  believe  that 
that  experience  can  only  be  realized  and  enjoyed  as  there 
is  given  deliberate  and  persona!  obedience  to  the  great 
imperatives  of  the  cross. 

There  are  three  imperatives  that  I  want  to  bring  before 
you.  The  first  you  will  find  in  2  Corinthians  5  :20,  “Now 
then  we  are  ambassadors  for  Christ,  as  though  God  did 
beseech  you  by  us :  we  pray  you  in  Christ’s  stead,  be  ye 
reconciled  to  God.”  That  is  the  imperative  of  the  cross, 
“Be  ye  reconciled  to  God.”  It  was  sin  that  made  that 
command  imperative.  It  was  sin  that  brought  about  the 
condition  of  peril  in  the  experience  of  the  human  race  that 
compelled  God  to  issue  that  command. 

This  is  the  day  of  grace  and  this  is  the  hour  of  oppor- 

97 


98 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


tunity,  and  therefore  if  any  one  has  not  yet  listened  to 
and  bowed  before  that  imperative  command  of  the  cross, 
“I  beseech  you,  be  reconciled  to  God/’  and  do  not  let  the 
opportunity  slip  away,  and  do  not  let  the  day  of  grace 
turn  into  the  night  of  dark  judgment.  The  imperative 
command  of  the  cross  is:  “Be  ye  reconciled  to  God,” 
and  the  way  to  be  reconciled  to  God  is  to  receive  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  as  your  Saviour,  God’s  gift  to  you,  through 
whose  death  reconciliation  has  been  made  possible. 

Now  let  me  turn  to  the  second  imperative,  which  is  the 
imperative  claim  of  the  cross,  1  Corinthians  6:20,  “For 
ye  are  bought  with  a  price:  therefore  glorify  God  in  your 
body,  and  in  your  spirit,  which  are  God’s.”  The  reason 
for  this  claim  is  that  we  are  bought.  Now  on  everything 
that  is  yours  you  have  a  claim.  If  you  go  into  a  store 
and  buy  something,  three  things  at  least  you  expect  to 
get ;  first,  value  for  your  money ;  second,  some  service  out 
of  what  you  purchase,  and  third,  some  pleasure  out  of 
what  you  get.  If  you  do  not  get  those  three  things  you 
have  made  a  very  poor  buy,  haven’t  you  ?  Oh,  I  wonder 
if  any  of  us  are  poor  bargains  to  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 
I  wonder  if  any  of  us  have  been  proving  that  for  all 
practical  purposes  Christ  has  died  in  vain  for  us,  that  we 
are  poor  bargains  for  the  Son  of  God. 

What  is  the  price  that  he  has  paid  for  us?  Calvary 
and  all  that  that  means  in  laying  down  his  life,  in  yield¬ 
ing  himself  into  the  hands  of  wicked  men,  in  surrendering 
himself  to  do  the  will  of  God.  That  is  the  price  he  has 
paid  for  us.  What  is  the  purpose  for  which  that  price 
has  been  said?  That  we  might  glorify  God.  That  we 
might  glorify  God  in  our  bodies  and  in  our  spirits,  which 
are  his :  that  is  to  say,  in  the  outer  life  and  the  inner  life ; 
in  the  activities  of  mind  and  body  as  well  as  in  the  attitude 
of  heart  and  spirit;  in  the  public  life  and  in  the  private 
life;  in  the  place  where  the  eyes  of  others  are  upon  us 
and  in  the  place  where  no  eye  is  on  us  except  the  eye  of 
God.  And  in  yielding  to  God  for  this  end  we  do  want  to 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


99 


remember  that  it  is  only  honest  and  honorable  to  do  so, 
because,  body  and  spirit,  we  are  his. 

Calvary  claims  the  whole  man,  because  Calvary  pro¬ 
claims  that  the  whole  man  has  been  purchased.  You 
remember  in  Titus  2 :14  how  Paul  says  that  we  have  been 
redeemed  from  all  iniquity  that  we  might  be  his  peculiar 
people,  that  is  to  say,  his  possession.  He  has  paid  out  a 
tremendous  price  for  that  possession,  and  he  is  looking 
for  interest  from  his  investment.  The  word  “peculiar 
people”  means  something  over  and  above  abundant  wealth. 
You  get  the  contrast  in  the  cognate  word  in  Matthew  6:11, 
“Give  us  this  day  our  daily  bread,”  bread  for  the  day, 
bread  that  is  just  sufficient,  just  sufficient  and  no  more. 
That  is  the  contrast,  but  that  is  not  what  God  is  looking 
for  in  you  and  in  me.  He  is  looking  for  abundance,  not 
merely  just  what  is  sufficient,  but  for  something  over  and 
above  that  which  is  actually  required  for  carrying  on  his 
work.  We  are  his  peculiar  people,  his  own  personal  pos¬ 
session,  that  we  might  be  an  abundance  of  wealth  for  him 
in  the  work  that  he  has  to  do. 

One  of  the  ways  in  which  we  can  give  God  some  wealth 
is  by  glorifying  him.  In  Scotland  for  many  a  long  gen¬ 
eration  we  have  had  in  our  schools  and  churches  a  cate¬ 
chism  called,  “The  Shorter  Catechism,”  one  of  the  finest 
groundworks  of  theology  ever  penned  by  man.  The  first 
question  in  that  catechism  is,  “What  is  man’s  chief  end  ?” 
And  the  answer  is :  “To  glorify  God  and  to  enjoy  Him 
forever.” 

Our  great  Scottish  philosopher,  Carlyle,  once  said,  “The 
older  I  grow  the  fuller  and  deeper  the  meaning  of  that 
answer  becomes.” 

How  am  I  to  glorify  God?  Let  me  put  before  you  one 
or  two  passages  of  Scripture:  Galatians  1 :24:  “And  they 
glorified  God  in  me.”  That  is  what  the  apostle  Paul  had 
to  say,  and  it  was  a  new  Paul  who  was  saying  it  to  the 
Christians  of  Galatia.  They  had  found  a  new  Paul  and 
therefore  they  glorified  God.  The  old  Paul  (or  Saul) 
was  one  of  whose  militant  spirit  they  had  had  the  most 


100 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


bitter  experience,  but  they  found  one  day  in  the  midst  of 
them  a  new  Saul.  The  reason  for  the  transformed  life 
of  Saul  of  Tarsus  was  simply  that  the  risen  Christ  had 
met  him  and  conquered  him  and  possessed  him.  Is  that 
not  the  secret  of  every  transformed  life?  That  is  the 
proof  that  the  work  of  Christ  is  not  vain,  when  that  trans¬ 
formation  takes  place.  That  is  God’s  starting-point.  To 
reach  the  goal  of  the  real  life  and  the  death  message  of 
the  cross  is  always  this :  You  are  the  sinner  Christ  can 
save,  and  you  are  the  one  whom  Christ  can  make  new. 
And  when  you  are  a  new  creature  your  old  friends  begin 
to  see  God  in  you  and  they  glorify  God. 

Take  1  Peter  2:12,  where  Paul  tells  us  that  we  glorify 
God  by  our  good  works.  The  question  is :  what  are  good 
works  ?  Not  necessarily  works  you  and  I  think  are  good 
and  not  necessarily  works  that  the  world  calls  good, 
because  there  are  many  works,  good  works,  that  may  yet 
have  at  the  back  of  them  a  selfish  motive.  They  may  be 
done  for  self-interest  or  for  sectarian  advantage.  Good 
works  are  accomplished  when  the  Holy  Spirit  finds  a  life 
so  free  that  it  can  become  the  channel  by  which  he  can 
pour  his  life  and  power  through  it,  and  so  make  men  see 
something  of  Christ  and  something  of  God;  and  when 
works  are  done  in  the  power  of  the  Spirit  they  are  stamped 
as  God-glorifying. 

John  21:19  says,  “This  spake  he,  signifying  by  what 
death  he  should  glorify  God.”  The  Lord  had  been  telling 
Peter  what  was  before  him,  and  it  was  not  a  smooth  path 
that  he  was  opening  out  before  Peter.  Then  the  evan¬ 
gelist  adds,  “This  spake  he,  signifying  by  what  death  he 
should  glorify  God.”  In  death  God  is  to  be  glorified. 
Some  one  has  said  that  the  last  act  of  a  man’s  life  is  the 
test  of  it;  that  is  to  say,  the  end  can  prove  what  the  life 
has  been.  Death  so  often  brings  out  the  dominant  note 
in  a  person’s  life.  For  instance,  Paul  could  say  as  he 
stood  before  eternity  with  the  glow  of  it  entering  into  his 
soul,  “I  have  fought  a  good  fight;  I  have  completed  the 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


101 


glorious  contest.”  And  the  infidel  philosopher  on  his 
deathbed  had  to  say,  “I  take  a  leap  into  the  dark.” 

Isaiah  24:15  reads,  “Glorify  ye  the  Lord  in  the  fires.” 
Oh,  the  testing  times  of  life  prove  whether  our  faith  is 
vital  or  only  nominal,  and  such  times  as  these  are  just 
like  battlefields  on  which  we  carry  the  colors  of  our 
Captain  to  glory  or  dishonor.  Without  the  trials  of  faith 
we  should  all  be  ruined.  These  trials  give  us  oppor¬ 
tunities  of  linking  ourselves  on  to  the  mighty  power  of 
God  and  bringing  through  the  trials  some  blessing  that 
wonderfully  glorifies  God,  or  else,  missing  God,  turns 
the  blessing  into  a  burden  that  fills  the  heart  with  weari¬ 
less  and  pain. 

Psalm  50:23  reads,  “Whoso  offereth  praise  glorifieth 
me.”  Now  I  come  to  something  that  is  within  the  reach 
of  everybody,  praise.  An  old  writer  has  said,  “Praise  is 
the  rent  we  owe  to  God.  Yes,  and  the  larger  the  firm  the 
greater  the  rent.”  Then  he  adds,  “The  Lord  has  many 
fine  firms  from  which  He  receives  but  little  rent.”  Do 
not  let  us  forget  the  103rd  Psalm,  to  be  sung  every  day, 
the  daily  Psalm  of  Praise. 

And  lastly,  John  15  :8  tells  us  what  the  Lord  says,  “And 
herein  is  my  Father  glorified,  that  ye  bear  much  fruit.” 
Now  what  is  fruit?  It  is  not  something  put  on,  it  is  some¬ 
thing  that  grows  out.  Fruit  is  a  product  of  the  life  of  the 
tree  through  the  branches,  and  in  a  Christian  sense  it  is 
the  life  of  Christ  through  character  and  through  conduct. 
It  is  likeness  to  Christ,  and  when  these  marks  of  Christ 
are  seen  in  us  then  God  the  Father  is  glorified.  So  the 
imperative  claim  of  the  cross  is  that  we  shall  glorify  God 
in  our  bodies  and  in  our  spirits,  which  are  his. 

Now  we  come  to  the  last  imperative,  which  is  the 
imperative  call  of  the  cross.  You  will  find  it  in  2  Corin¬ 
thians  5:15,  just  three  words  in  that  verse,  “Henceforth 
unto  him.”  That  is  the  imperative  call  of  the  cross,  that 
we  should  live  no  longer  unto  ourselves  but  unto  Him 
who  died  for  us  and  rose  again.  That  is  the  natural  con¬ 
clusion  of  obeying  the  command  and  of  yielding  to  the 


102 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


claim  of  the  cross.  It  means  simply  to  acknowledge  with¬ 
out  any  reservation  the  supremacy  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ. 

Note  these  passages :  “For  to  this  end  Christ  both  died, 
and  rose,  and  revived,  that  he  might  be  Lord  both  of  the 
dead  and  living”  (Rom.  14:9);  “Therefore  let  all  the 
house  of  Israel  know  assuredly,  that  God  hath  made  that 
same  Jesus,  whom  ye  have  crucified,  both  Lord  and 
Christ”  (Acts  2:36)  ;  “That  at  the  name  of  Jesus  every 
knee  should  bow,  of  things  in  heaven,  and  things  in  earth, 
and  things  under  the  earth”  (Phil.  2:10). 

This  supremacy  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  both 
exclusive  and  inclusive.  It  is  exclusive  inasmuch  as  it 
forbids  any  one  or  any  thing  rivaling  it.  Christ  is 
the  one  absolute  law,  and  the  acknowledgment  of  the 
supremacy  of  Christ  implies  the  denial  of  the  right  of 
anything  else  to  be  supreme. 

About  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  there  was 
the  last  of  the  rebellions  in  Scotland.  It  was  called  the 
Jacobite  Rebellion.  It  was  an  attempt  on  the  part  of  the 
Stuarts  to  regain  the  throne  of  Britain  and  place  the  one 
who  was  called  “The  Young  Pretender,”  Prince  Charles, 
Bonny  Prince  Charlie,  as  he  is  called  in  Scottish  songs, 
on  the  throne.  He  went  on  the  northeast  coast  of  Scot¬ 
land  and  set  up  his  standard  there,  and  his  first  meeting 
was  with  a  great  Highland  chief,  Cameron.  Lochiel  knew 
more  about  the  situation  than  his  prince,  and  tried,  by 
every  possible  means  in  his  power,  to  dissuade  him  from 
what  he  knew  was  a  hopeless  effort.  The  prince  listened 
to  him,  and  then  sadly  said,  “Well,  I  suppose  I  shall  have 
to  go  forward  without  the  support  of  Lochiel,  who  my 
father  assured  me  would  always  be  with  me  to  guide  and 
strengthen  and  counsel  me.” 

This  was  too  much  for  Lochiel,  and  flinging  himself  at 
the  feet  of  his  prince  he  said,  “Nay,  my  prince  shall  have 
Lochiel  and  everything  that  Lochiel  possesses,  and  every 
one  over  whom  Lochiel  has  any  authority,  for  anything 
that  he  wants  to  be  done.” 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


103 


Now  it  is  just  an  unreserved  acceptance  of  the 
supremacy  of  Christ  like  that,  that  Christ  is  wanting,  such 
an  unreserved  acceptance  of  his  supremacy  that  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  is  asking  from  you  and  from  me.  That  is 
the  call  of  Christ. 

Do  not  let  any  one  of  us  imagine  that  there  can  be  a 
dual  sovereignty  in  our  lives,  Christ  and  something  else. 
Christ  never  goes  halves  with  anything  or  with  any  one; 
it  is  all  or  nothing.  That  is  the  claim  that  he  makes,  and 
when  you  respond  to  that  claim  as  Lochiel  responded  to 
the  call  of  his  prince,  you  can  love  everybody  and  you 
will  find  that  everything  else  in  life  falls  into  its  right 
place. 

This  supremacy  that  is  very  decided  in  its  exclusiveness 
is  as  clear  in  its  inclusiveness.  While  it  excludes  every 
rival,  it  brings  under  its  rule  and  government  the  whole 
man.  And  if  that  call  is  answered  God  will  withhold  no 
good  thing  from  you.  Life  is  full  of  the  most  splendid 
possibilities  for  the  soul  that  will  dare  to  be  unreservedly 
true  to  the  supremacy  of  Christ.  Life  begins  to  glow  with 
a  wonderful  glory,  when,  at  the  heart  of  it,  there  is  a 
yieldedness  that  makes  Christ  sovereign. 

What  does  this  inclusiveness  mean?  Let  me  try  and 
put  it  simply  before  <you.  What  does  this  inclusive 
supremacy  mean?  It  means  the  supremacy  of  Christ 
over  our  minds.  There  is  no  channel  through  which 
Satan  is  operating  to-day  with  more  success  than  through 
the  mind.  “The  god  of  this  world  hath  blinded  the  minds 
of  those  who  believe  not/’  and  who  are  perishing,  and  the 
mind  of  the  unbeliever  hates  the  cross,  it  revolts  against 
the  claim  of  the  cross.  It  is  always  toning  down  the 
language  of  the  cross  or  dispensing  with  the  language  of 
the  cross  altogether,  just  because  the  cross  is  God’s 
weapon  for  tearing  aside  the  Satanic  veil  and  letting  the 
light  in. 

Even  with  the  Christian  there  may  be  disinclination  to 
allow  the  Lord  Jesus  to  have  the  mind,  the  intellect,  yielded. 


/ 


104 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 

t 

There  is  a  man  on  the  other  side  of  the  water  whom  I 
know,  one  of  the  best  men  whom  I  have  ever  met,  but 
when  he  was  at  the  university  he  was  a  yielded  Christian 
on  every  point  except  his  mind.  He  was  afraid  to  let 
Christ  have  his  intellect,  full  control  of  his  intellect.  But 
he  was  brought  by  the  Spirit  of  God  to  that  point  where 
he  yielded  his  intellect,  and  found  the  Holy  Spirit  flood¬ 
ing  and  filling  him,  and  his  intellect  was  sanctified. 
You  and  I  need  sanctified  intellects  to-day,  sanctified 
minds,  yielded,  Christ-controlled  minds.  Remember  that 
a  mind  unsurrendered  is  a  mind  unguarded,  and  that  is 
the  reason  why  I  believe  there  are  so  many  minds  to-day 
that  are  becoming  the  dumping  grounds  of  all  the  possible 
fancies  that  are  floating  about  in  the  air  inspired  and 
dictated  by  the  devil,  and  they  are  getting  led  off  the  path 
and  deluded  and  deceived. 

You  know  that  the  battle  of  Eden  was  fought  in  the 
mind.  Eve  yielded  her  mind  to  the  evil  one  and  took,  and 
the  moment  she  believed  and  took  in  the  devil’s  lie,  the 
truth  of  God  went  out.  She  took  in  death,  and  life  went 
out ;  she  took  in  darkness,  and  light  went  out ;  and  through 
the  stream  of  humanity’s  life  the  poison  has  flowed,  and  it 
is  flowing  to-day.  God  is  so  concerned  about  getting  the 
minds  of  men  and  women  yielded  to  him  and  controlled 
by  him,  because  the  mind  is  the  strategic  position,  and 
therefore  we  have  to  ask  now:  Is  there  deliverance  for 
the  mind?  Yes,  there  is,  at  the  cross. 

Read  2  Corinthians  10:3-6,  “For  though  we  walk  in  the 
flesh,  we  do  not  war  after  the  flesh :  ( for  the  weapons  of 
our  warfare  are  not  carnal,  but  mighty  through  God  to 
the  pulling  down  of  strong  holds ;)  casting  down  imagina¬ 
tions,  and  every  high  thing  that  exalteth  itself  against  the 
knowledge  of  God,  and  bringing  into  captivity  every 
thought  to  the  obedience  of  Christ;  and  having  in  a  readi¬ 
ness  to  revenge  all  disobedience,  when  your  obedience  is 
fulfilled.”  The  cross -is  the  place  of  deliverance,  the  way 
of  the  cross  is  God’s  weapon  to  destroy  the  Satanic  veil 
that  hangs  over  the  minds  of  men  to-day ;  and  we  want 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


105 


to  recognize  that  the  unyielded  mind  and  uncontrolled 
mind,  the  mind  uncontrolled  by  Christ,  belongs  to  the  old 
creation,  and  therefore  it  has  to  go  to  the  cross,  it  has  to 
be  dealt  with  by  the  cross,  by  the  death  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ.  That  uncontrolled  mind  has  to  be  deliberately,  by 
faith,  and  the  act  of  the  will,  on  the  ground  of  Calvary, 
taken  from  the  enemy  and  put  to  the  cross,  and  then  God 
trusted  to  give  a  new  mind,  a  clear  mind,  a  wise  mind, 
a  sound  mind ;  for  that  is  God’s  gift  to  his  children.  God 
gives  us  sound  minds ;  and  a  mind  under  the  control  of 
the  Spirit  of  God  is  such  a  mind  as  that.  He  wants  that 
mind  of  yours,  and  if  there  is  some  point  there  where  you 
are  not  surrendered,  that  is  the  imperative  call  of  the 
cross  to  you  now.  The  cross  claims  the  supremacy  of 
your  thought  life. 

In  the  second  place,  Christ  claims  the  supremacy  over 
the  heart,  and  I  want  you  to  read  two  passages  of  Scrip¬ 
ture,  “Out  of  the  heart  proceedeth  evil  thoughts,”  and 
Hebrews  4: 12,  “For  the  word  of  God  is  quick,  and  pow¬ 
erful,  and  sharper  than  any  two-edged  sword,  piercing 
even  to  the  dividing  asunder  of  soul  and  spirit.”  The 
first  passage  is  a  picture  of  the  natural  heart,  which  sup¬ 
plies  the  life.  The  second  passage  is  the  heart  under 
treatment  by  the  great  Surgeon  of  love.  And  how  does 
he  treat  it?  By  the  knife  of  the  Word,  and  whatever  the 
knife  of  the  Word  lays  bare  there  is  shown  to  you  and  to 
me  the  way  of  life  and  victory. 

One  of  God’s  great  purposes  with  you  and  with  me  in 
these  days  is  to  make  us  know  how  to  get  soul  and  spirit 
asunder,  how  to  get  soul  and  spirit  divided.  I  am  just 
beginning  to  understand  a  little  about  it,  the  division  be¬ 
tween  the  soul  and  the  spirit.  There  are  three  parts  of 
us,  the  spirit  (that  is  meant  to  be  in  continuous  touch 
with  the  Holy  Spirit),  and  the  soul,  and  then  the  body 
(which  is  the  lower  part  of  us).  The  soul  is  the  battle¬ 
ground,  the  soul  is  the  seat  of  our  senses,  of  our  person¬ 
ality,  the  seat  of  the  old  man,  the  seat  of  the  self-life,  and 
that  is  the  battlefield  of  life.  It  is  on  the  soul  that  Satan 


106 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


is  continually  sending  his  onslaughts,  because  if  he  can  win 
the  battle  in  the  soul  he  puts  the  soul  up  upon  the  top 
and  the  spirit  is  brought  down.  Whenever  the  soul  life  is 
supreme,  dominant,  then  the  spirit  and  the  body  get  out 
of  order. 

We  hear  a  great  deal  to-day  about  the  psychic,  and  that 
is  the  soulish,  that  is  the  place  where  the  enemy  to-day  is 
at  work  deceiving  people,  and  through  this  psychic  send¬ 
ing  forth  deceptions  and  delusions  by  which  men  and 
women  are  being  entrapped  by  him  and  being  led  to 
believe  in  what  Paul  calls  the  declarations  of  demons  as 
if  they  were  the  truth  of  God.  You  will  find  that  all 
these  false  cults  to-day  are  developing  the  psychic.  The 
whole  emphasis  is  being  put  upon  the  soulish  part  of  the 
being. 

What  does  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  say?  You  will  find 
this  is  always  the  point  of  difference.  The  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  says  these  things  have  to  go  to  the  cross,  and  the 
cross  is  the  only  place  of  safety  for  the  psychic.  The 
devil  says  “Develop  the  psychic.,,  Christ  says,  “To  the 
cross  with  it,”  “If  any  man  will  save  his  life  he  shall 
lose  it.  If  any  man  will  lose  his  life  [that  is,  the  psychic 
life] ,  he  shall  find  it  again,”  in  its  right  way,  and  he  shall 
find  it  in  a  way  that  will  help  him  to  use  it  to  the  best 
purpose.  But  if  he  develops  the  natural  away  from  the 
spiritual  he  allows  the  soulish  part  of  himself  to  become 
dominant  in  him  and  the  spirit  becomes  weak,  and  the 
body  gets  out  of  order,  and  life  becomes  deceived  and 
sidetracked. 

Therefore  God's  great  purpose  is  to  get  us  to  see  the 
place  of  the  cross  and  the  purpose  of  the  cross  in  our 
lives,  working  through  the  Word  of  God  to  put  the  soul 
on  that  side  and  the  spiritual  up  on  the  top ;  and  when  the 
spiritual  is  on  the  top,  if  touched  by  the  Holy  Spirit, 
disciplined  by  the  Holy  Spirit,  governed  and  guided  by 
the  Holy  Spirit,  then  the  spirit  keeps  the  soul  in  its  place 
and  the  soul  and  the  body  work  out  the  functions  for 
which  God  has  created  them. 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


107 


The  knife  of  the  Word  is  here  to  lay  bare  in  our  lives 
all  that  needs  to  go  to  the  cross ;  and  when  we  obey  the 
Holy  Spirit  and  the  Word  of  God,  then  we  find  God 
dealing  with  the  heart  of  each  of  us  in  a  way  that  makes 
the  heart  healthy.  When  you  and  I  put  away  everything 
that  the  Word  of  God  shows  us  is  soulish  and  sinful,  and 
when  we  put  it  to  the  cross,  then  the  cross  is  doing  its 
work  and  the  spirit  is  becoming  supreme. 

I  know  something  about  it  myself,  but  it  is  one  of  the 
most  difficult  things  to  explain  to  others,  and  it  is  only 
something  that  you  are  led  into  in  experience  if  you  will  go 
instantly  to  the  Holy  Spirit  about  it  and  say,  “Let  me 
know  the  meaning  of  these  things,”  and  if  you  are  will¬ 
ing  to  pay  the  price. 

Christ  claims  supremacy  over  the  conscience  (Acts 
24: 16),  “And  herein  do  I  exercise  myself,  to  have  always 
a  conscience  void  of  offence  toward  God,  and  toward 
men.”  You  will  find  a  difference.  A  conscience  that  is 
being  controlled  by  the  world  or  by  the  prince  of  the 
world  is  usually  a  quiescent  conscience,  an  inactive  con¬ 
science.  A  conscience  that  is  controlled  by  Jesus  Christ 
is  a  quickened  conscience.  There  is  the  difference :  Con¬ 
science  requires  right  treatment.  Conscience  is  often 
ignored,  even  by  Christian  people,  treated  as  an  insignifi¬ 
cant  quantity,  and  custom — the  custom  of  the  place  where 
we  live,  the  opinion  of  others,  our  own  desires — take= 
the  place  of  conscience.  It  was  not  so  with  Paul ;  he  said, 
“I  exercise  my  conscience,  that  I  may  have  a  conscience 
void  of  offence  toward  God  and  men,”  and  conscience 
demands  honest  dealing  if  it  is  to  be  kept  healthy. 

Some  people  are  not  honest  with  their  conscience,  and 
they  are  always  transferring  the  blame  from  themselves 
to  some  others,  instead  of  allowing  conscience  to  bring 
them  to  the  bar  and  say,  “Thou  art  the  man.” 

I  was  preaching  some  time  ago  in  Scotland,  when  a 
young  girl  of  seventeen  came  into  the  vestry  of  the  church 
at  the  close  of  the  service,  and  said  to  me,  “I  am  going 
to  say  something  that  will  surprise  you.”  I  pricked  up 


108 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


my  ears,  and  this  is  what  she  said,  “I  decided  for  Christ 
when  I  was  fourteen,  but  I  have  been  very  disappointed 
with  him.  I  never  thought  that  he  would  leave  me  alone.” 

“Well,”  I  said,  “go  on.”  It  was  a  surprising  thing  to 
hear. 

So  she  told  me  this  story,  that  the  night  she  decided 
for  Christ  she  went  home  and  she  did  not  confess  Christ. 
The  Holy  Spirit  told  her  to  confess  him  again  and  again 
through  the  days  and  the  weeks  that  followed.  The  Holy 
Spirit  pressed  her  to  confess  Christ  in  her  home,  and 
one  day  she  said,  “I  woke  up  to  find  myself  in  darkness 
and  Christ  had  left  me.  I  never  thought  he  would  for¬ 
sake  me.” 

“My  dear  child,”  I  said,  “the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  as  I 
know  him,  is  not  a  hard  taskmaster,  and  you  have  only 
got  to  come  back  to  him  in  penitence  and  confession  of 
sin  and  seek  the  cleansing  of  his  blood,  and  I  am  per¬ 
fectly  sure  he  will  forgive.” 

“Oh,  I  have  done  that,”  she  exclaimed,  “and  it  is  no 
good.” 

Then  I  saw  something  in  her,  and  I  said,  “Now  look 
here,  you  are  not  honest.  You  are  not  letting  your  con¬ 
science  be  honest.  You  have  got  a  root  of  bitterness  in 
your  heart  against  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  haven’t  you?” 
And  she  dropped  her  head.  “You  have  been  transferring 
to  him  the  blame  that  is  on  your  own  shoulders.  On 
your  own  confession  you  disobeyed  the  Holy  Spirit,  and 
yet  you  are  here  trying  to  make  out  that  it  is  Christ  who 
has  left  you,  and  you  know  yourself  what  has  happened. 
You  will  never  get  peace  and  you  will  never  get  joy  or 
anything  else  until  you  come  back  to  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
and  confess, — not  only  the  sin  of  not  confessing  him,  but 
the  greater  sin  of  misjudging  him.  Then  you  must  seek 
the  cleansing  and  go  back  and  confess  Christ,  and  you 
will  find  the  Holy  Spirit  where  you  left  him.” 

Do  you  know,  a  conscience  is  a  very  troublesome  thing? 
Have  you  found  it  so?  I  hope  you  have,  and  if  you  have 
not  I  hope  you  will  go  back  from  this  conference  and  find 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


109 


it  so.  It  is  troublesome  if  it  is  healthy,  but  it  will  never 
work  rightly  until  you  have  made  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
supreme  over  it  and  said  to  yourself,  “I  will  obey  the 
Holy  Spirit  in  matters  of  conscience,  no  matter  what  it 
costs  me.” 

Let  me  carry  you  to  another  point.  Christ  claims 
supremacy  over  the  will,  and  here  is  a  very  important 
point,  for  it  is  perhaps  the  strategic  position  in  our  lives, 
here  is  the  citadel  in  our  lives,  the  will.  He  claims  suprem¬ 
acy  over  the  will.  Remember  this,  that  supremacy  will 
be  clearly  and  consistently  contested  by  Satan.  It  is  well 
to  understand  the  difference  between  a  will  under  the 
supremacy  of  Satan  and  a  will  under  the  supremacy  of 
Christ.  We  have  to  remember  this  especially  in  these 
days,  that  the  essential  condition  of  Satan  of  supremacy 
over  the  will  is  what  I  have  discussed  as  passivity. 

I  want  to  illustrate  that  by  a  contrast.  It  is  a  disease 
that  is  afflicting  multitudes  of  Christian  people  to-day. 
Passivity  means  dropping  the  will;  the  supremacy  of 
Christ  always  means  linking  the  will  with  the  Holy  Spirit. 
Passivity  means  substituting  the  will  of  another  for  your 
own  will ;  the  supremacy  of  Christ  means  accepting  God’s 
will  as  right  and  then  putting  your  will  in  line  with  his  to 
carry  out  his.  Passivity  always  makes  one  an  automaton, 
a  machine;  the  supremacy  of  Christ  teaches  you  how  to 
use  your  intelligence,  your  common-sense.  Passivity 
makes  you  accept  all  that  happens  as  the  will  of  God  for 
you ;  the  supremacy  of  Christ  leads  you  to  test  every¬ 
thing  that  happens,  by  the  cross,  and  to  accept  nothing 
that  you  are  not  sure  is  the  will  of  God.  Passivity  opens 
the  way  to  the  inrush  of  evil  spirits  and  to  the  deceptions 
and  delusions  of  Satan,  and  he  is  giving  people  to-day 
counterfeit  holiness,  counterfeit  piety,  counterfeit  powers ; 
he  can  counterfeit  every  blessing  of  God  that  God  has  in 
his  heart  for  his  children  to-day.  He  can  counterfeit  them 
and  he  is  doing  it.  The  supremacy  of  Christ  always  leads 
you  into  co-operation  with  the  Holy  Spirit  to  walk  with’ 
him  by  means  of  a  living  faith  and  an  intelligent  obedi- 


110 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


ence,  and  that  is  the  only  way  in  which  you  can  be  kept 
safe  in  these  days. 

This  is  the  mark  of  a  will  under  the  supremacy  of 
Christ,  in  perfect  co-operation  with  the  Holy  Spirit  to 
accomplish  divine  tasks,  and  the  imperative  call  of  the 
cross  is  for  such  as  that,  such  a  will  as  that  to-day,  because 
of  the  need  of  God  in  regard  to  the  world,  and  the  need 
of  the  world  for  God. 

Oh,  men  and  women,  God  can  reach  the  world  to-day 
only  through  you,  with  wills,  and  the  world  can  only  be 
convinced  of  the  powers  of  God  to  satisfy  it  as  it  sees 
lives  in  which  the  power  is  at  work.  I  fell  some  time  ago 
upon  peculiar  lines  that  I  want  to  read  to  you,  that  have 
a  great  truth  in  them: 

“O,  will  my  will  to  will  Thy  will, 

And  then  to  will  is  well. 

The  willing'  will  which  wills  God’s  will 
Within  God’s  will  will  dwell.” 

Christ  asks  the  supremacy  over  our  wills. 

One  word  more.  He  claims  the  supremacy  over  the 
body.  Will  you  note  these  texts :  1  Corinthians  3 :  16, 

“Know  ye  not  that  ye  are  the  temple  of  God,  and  that 
the  Spirit  of  God  dwelleth  in  you?”;  6:15,  19,  “Know 
ye  not  that  your  bodies  are  the  members  of  Christ?  shall 
I  then  take  the  members  of  Christ,  and  make  them  the 
members  of  an  harlot?  God  forbid”;  Romans  12:1,  “I 
beseech  you  therefore,  brethren,  by  the  mercies  of  God, 
that  ye  present  your  bodies  a  living  sacrifice,  holy,  accept¬ 
able  unto  God,  which  is  your  reasonable  service.” 

There  are  two  descriptions  of  the  body  in  the  Word  of 
God,  the  first  is  the  temple  of  God,  and  the  second  is  the 
body  of  sin.  As  a  temple,  it  is  to  be  yielded  to  the  Holy 
Spirit  to  be  indwelt  by  him;  as  a  body  of  sin  it  is  to  be 
put  out  of  action  by  its  members  being  mortified.  How 
is  it  to  be  done?  Second  Corinthians  13:4,  “For  though 
he  was  crucified  through  weakness,  yet  he  liveth  by  the 
power  of  God.  For  we  also  are  weak  in  him,  but  we 
shall  live  with  him  by  the  power  of  God  toward  you,”  and 


The  Imperatives  of  the  Cross 


111 


the  power  of  God  operates  to  make  Christ  supreme,  and 
we  live  no  longer  unto  ourselves  but  unto  Him.  That  is 
to  have  Christ  on  the  throne  inspiring  and  regulating  life 
in  each  department  and  detail. 

There  is  only  one  head  of  the  body,  that  is  Christ,  and 
just  as  body  and  will,  conscience  and  heart  and  mind 
respond  in  loving,  cheerful  obedience  to  the  head,  does  life 
become  fruitful  in  service  and  radiant  in  experience,  so 
that  brings  us  to  the  point  of  consecration. 

What  is  consecration?  It  is  not  giving  up  something 
to  God,  it  is  not  even  giving  myself  to  God.  I  have  noth¬ 
ing  to  give.  Myself  is  not  worth  giving.  If  you  will 
look  in  the  Old  Testament  you  will  find  that  consecration 
means  coming  to  God  with  empty  hands,  and  he  putting 
something  into  them  that  we  can  give  to  him.  Consecra¬ 
tion  means  God  coming  in,  possessing,  filling,  conscience, 
heart,  will,  mind,  body, — his  temple,  and  then  that  temple, 
every  whit  of  it,  utters  his  glory. 

Prayer 

Dismiss  us,  Lord,  with  thy  blessing,  and  keep  thy 
Word  in  our  hearts  and  minds,  that  the  blessed  Holy 
Spirit  may  have  something  to  work  upon  to  do  what  needs 
to  be  done.  Continue  thy  presence  with  us  throughout  the 
hours  of  this  day,  and  lift  our  eyes  to  thine  on  the  throne. 

Glory  be  to  the  Father,  and  to  the  Son,  and  to  the  Holy 
Ghost.  As  it  was  in  the  beginning,  is  now  and  ever  shall 
be,  world  without  end.  Amen. 


IX 


FOLLOWING  THE  LAMB 
THE  WAY  OF  THE  CROSS 

THERE  has  been  a  message  laid  upon  my  heart  which 
I  think  is  expressive  of  the  Lord’s  desire  in  relation 
to  each  one  of  us,  as  it  is  a  challenge  to  our  profession  as 
Christian  men  and  women.  You  will  find  it  in  Revela¬ 
tion  14:4,  in  the  middle  of  the  verse,  “These  are  they 
which  follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goeth.  These 
were  redeemed  from  among  men,  being  the  first  fruits 
unto  God  and  to  the  Lamb.  And  in  their  mouth  was 
found  no  guile:  for  they  are  without  fault  before  the 
throne  of  God.” 

I  desire  to  take  these  words  away  from  their  dispensa- 
tional  setting  and  apply  them  to  this  hour;  for  what  is 
practically  true  of  the  future  can  always  be,  I  think,  spir¬ 
itually  true  of  the  present.  To  follow  the  Lamb  is  the 
definition  of  discipleship.  To  follow  the  Lamb  whither¬ 
soever  he  goes  is  the  test  of  discipleship. 

What  the  Church  is  needing  and  what  the  world  is 
waiting  for  is  a  race  of  men  and  women  who  will  follow 
the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goes,  and  who  will  shake  off 
all  the  risks  and  bear  all  the  consequences  of  such  fol¬ 
lowing. 

Following  the  Lamb  is  not  exactly  talking  about  him. 
What  we  are  needing  to-day  is  not  mere  talkers  but  more 

112 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


113 


walkers.  In  a  city  in  the  north  of  Scotland  where  I  spent 
my  school  and  university  days  we  had  a  minister,  the 
principal  of  a  theological  college,  who  was  a  very  great 
man  of  God.  His  name  was  Dr.  Brown.  There  lived 
next  door  to  him  another  man  of  exactly  the  same  name, 
but  a  medical  doctor.  One  night  a  man  was  ushered  into 
the  minister’s  study,  very  hastily,  and  began  describing 
the  symptoms  of  the  trouble  at  home.  The  minister,  who 
loved  a  little  bit  of  a  joke,  with  a  twinkle  in  his  eye  said 
to  this  man  that  he  was  afraid  he  had  come  to  the  wrong 
Dr.  Brown.  The  man  in  his  anxiety  burst  out,  “The  Dr. 
Brown  I  want  is  not  the  Dr.  Brown  that  preaches  but  the 
Dr.  Brown  that  practises.” 

I  want  that  story  to  sink  into  your  hearts  and  mem¬ 
ories.  That  is  exactly  what  the  world  is  saying  to-day: 
“We  are  not  much  taken  up  with  the  Doctor  Browns  who 
preach,  we  want  the  Doctor  Browns  who  practise  what 
they  preach.”  That  is  the  walker  and  not  the  talker.  The 
most  eloquent  talker  is  the  man  who  follows  the  Lamb 
whithersoever  he  goes.  The  most  successful  worker  for 
God  is  the  man  who  will  give  obedience  to  the  Lamb  up 
to  the  last  glimmer  of  light  that  is  given  to  him. 

What  does  following  the  Lamb  mean?  It  means  two 
things:  first,  the  whole-hearted  acceptance  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  in  a  threefold  position,  as  the  Prophet  who 
reveals  the  will  of  God,  which  it  is  our  duty  and  privilege 
to  do ;  as  the  Priest,  who  through  the  offering  of  himself 
on  the  cross  calls  you  and  me  to  a  life  of  sacrifice,  a  life 
of  blessing,  a  life  of  intercession ;  as  the  King,  who  alone 
has  the  right  to  our  lives.  It  means  the  wholehearted 
acceptance  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as  Saviour,  Lord,  and 
King,  and  then  it  means,  as  well,  instant,  unquestioning 
obedience  to  him  in  the  daily  life.  Not  the  obedience  that 
is  given  by  fits  and  starts ;  not  the  obedience  that  is  easy 


114 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


to  give ;  not  easy  circumstances ;  not  easy  surroundings ; 
obedience  that  is  meant  in  the  hymn  where  the  writer  says : 

“Anywhere  with  Jesus, 

Though  He  Ieadeth  me 
Where  the  path  is  rough  and  rude, 

Where  the  dangers  be ; 

Though  He  taketh  from  my  heart 
All  I  love  below, 

Anywhere  with  Jesus 
I  will  gladly  go.” 

Acceptance  and  obedience,  these  are  the  essential  condi¬ 
tions  of  discipleship. 

There  is  nothing  in  these  days  that  we  are  more  con¬ 
stantly  engaged  in,  both  in  theological  and  political  circles, 
than  the  endeavor  to  get  a  proper  definition  for  matters 
which  concern  us ;  and  there  is  nothing  which  gives  rise  to 
greater  controversy  than  definitions.  But  here,  in  terms 
that  are  of  the  clearest  description,  with  words  that  no  one 
can  mistake,  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  defines  discipleship, 
“Whosoever  doth  not  bear  his  cross  and  come  after  me 
cannot  be  my  disciple.”  “They  follow  the  Lamb  whither¬ 
soever  he  goes.”  Discipleship  means  to  stand  in  the 
most  definite  relation  to  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  in  the 
acceptance  of  him  and  in  obedience  to  him.  That  is  the 
essential  condition  of  discipleship,  taking  up  the  cross  and 
following  him,  accepting  him  in  the  fulness  of  his  claims, 
giving  obedience  to  him  up  to  the  last  glimmer  of  light 
that  we  have. 

Perhaps  some  of  you  say,  “Well,  I  am  following  him 
as  best  I  can,  according  to  my  own  ideas,  my  own  plans,” 
and  perhaps  some  of  you  are  following  him  just  as  far  as 
you  want  to ;  but  that  is  not  following  the  Lamb.  Follow¬ 
ing  the  Lamb  is  not  following  him  according  to  my  ideas 
and  my  ways;  it  is  not  following  him  just  as  far  as  I 
want  to.  Following  the  Lamb  means  letting  the  Lamb 
have  the  control  of  every  department  and  detail  of  your 
life. 

Let  us  make  no  mistake  about  the  cross  that  we  have 
to  take  up.  The  cross  is  not  that  old  temper  of  yours, 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


115 


that  is  a  cross  to  some  other  body,  the  one  who  has  to 
live  with  you.  The  cross  is  not  some  undesirable  circum¬ 
stance  that  you  cannot  get  away  from.  What  is  the  cross  ? 
The  cross  is  what  identifies  us  with  Jesus  Christ  and 
marks  out  our  discipleship.  The  cross  is  what  separates 
us  from  the  world  in  its  worldliness  and  its  Christ-rejec- 
tion  and  separates  our  lives  unto  him.  The  cross  is  what 
stands  between  us  and  every  temptation  to  be  disloyal  to 
Christ  and  to  his  scheme  of  redemption  and  to  his  blessed 
Book.  The  cross  is  what  we  died  by  to  the  manifested 
forms  of  self  life.  The  cross  is  what  takes  us  into  union 
with  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  and  keeps  us  in  definite  union 
with  him.  “If  any  man  doth  not  bear  his  cross  and  come 
after  me  he  cannot  be  my  disciple.” 

Christ  and  the  cross,  and  Christian  witness,  are  insep¬ 
arable.  In  one  word,  discipleship  is  just  making  Christ 
first  in  life,  and  last,  and  all  the  way  through ;  it  is  making 
Christ  in  life  what  the  cross  has  made  him  in  heaven,  and 
what  the  cross  will  yet  make  him  in  his  Father’s  universe, 
supreme  and  preeminent. 

Does  that  describe  our  attitude  to  Christ  ?  Is  that  a  true 
picture  of  our  discipleship?  The  hour  calls  for  an  un¬ 
ambiguous  answer  to  the  question:  Where  have  I  put 
Christ  in  my  life ? 

A  Christian  does  not  reject  Christ  as  Saviour  from  sin, 
but  he  may  reject  Christ  as  the  master  of  his  life.  A 
Christian  does  not  refuse  the  gift  of  Christ’s  life,  but  he 
may  refuse  Christ  the  gift  of  his  life.  A  Christian  accepts 
the  salvation  of  Jesus  Christ,  but  he  may  refuse  or  deny 
the  supremacy  of  Jesus  Christ;  and  the  question  of  all 
questions  is  this:  Where  and  what  is  Christ  in  my  life? 
Is  he  first?  Is  he  supreme?  Is  he  the  acknowledged, 
crowned  Lord  of  my  life? 

That  is  the  condition  of  discipleship.  You  may  object 
to  it,  but  it  is  there.  You  may  say  the  standard  is  impos¬ 
sible,  but  it  is  there.  You  may  answer  that  the  terms 
of  Christ  are  far  too  high,  but  there  they  are.  And  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  will  not  lower  his  standard  or  lessen 


116 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


his  claims  to  get  any  one  of  us.  He  has  laid  down  his 
conditions,  “I  am  Alpha  and  Omega,  the  First  and  the 
Last.  If  any  one  will  come  after  me  let  him  take  up  the 
cross  and  follow  me.”  And  the  emphasis  that  you  put 
upon  the  “ME”  will  decide  the  strength  or  the  weakness 
of  your  discipleship. 

Ere  I  go  further  let  me  ask  this :  Who  can  follow  the 
Lamb?  You  will  notice  in  my  text  that  there  is  a  twofold 
description  of  those  who  follow  the  Lamb.  The  first  is 
redeemed  from  among  men.  That  is  the  character  of 
them,  by  which  they  were  known  in  heaven  as  heaven  saw 
them  when  they  were  on  earth.  Have  we  all  come  to  this 
point?  Are  we  all  able  to  say,  “Thank  God,  I  am  re¬ 
deemed  ;  not  by  silver  and  gold  but  by  the  precious  blood 
of  this  Lamb”?  Are  we  all  in  this  condition  to-night,  so 
that  with  a  perfect,  glad,  humble  but  real  assurance,  we 
can  say,  “Yes,  I  am  redeemed”? 

One  of  our  great  Scottish  preachers  of  the  eighteenth 
century  put  the  Gospel  in  a  nutshell.  He  said,  “On  the 
one  hand  it  is  a  personal  offer  of  salvation  through  a 
Saviour;  on  the  other  hand  it  is  the  personal  acceptance 
of  salvation  through  a  Saviour.”  You  could  not  have  it 
simpler  than  that.  An  offer  of  salvation  through  a  Saviour 
is  made  to  you,  and  your  part  is  what?  Personal  accept¬ 
ance  of  salvation  through  a  Saviour.  Will  you  accept 
that?  You  know  you  are  a  sinner.  You  know  that  noth¬ 
ing  you  can  do  will  give  your  heart  peace  and  your  life 
power.  You  know  it  in  your  own  spirit,  and  sometimes 
when  the  thought  of  eternity  breaks  in  upon  you  you  are 
at  the  point  of  despair,  for  you  know  that  your  best  efforts 
are  of  no  avail.  Will  you  stop,  then,  and  just  lay  hold  of 
this  wonderful  salvation  which  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
offers  to  you,  and  will  you  say  in  your  heart,  “Yes,  God, 
I  accept  salvation  through  Thee”?  That  will  put  you 
among  the  redeemed  of  God. 

Notice  that  the  redeemed  means  “a  bought  one.”  A 
redeemed  man  is  a  man  who  has  been  purchased  and 
whose  placing  is  at  the  disposal  of  the  purchaser.  The 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


117 


redeemed  man  is  one  who  has  been  loosed  from  his  sin, 
loosed  from  his  self-life,  loosed  from  the  spirit  of  the 
world,  loosed  from  the  domination  of  Satan;  he  is  a 
redeemed  one.  Oh,  what  a  redemption  Jesus  Christ  has 
wrought  out !  It  is  not  a  thing  that  touches  your  life  only 
at  one  little  point  and  says,  “Now  you  are  saved  from 
hell.”  It  is  a  redemption  that  takes  in  your  redemption 
past,  present,  and  future,  every  need  of  it.  It  is  all  in¬ 
cluded  in  the  redemption  of  Jesus  Christ.  The  redeemed 
one  is  one  who  is  loosed  and  bought,  and  who  therefore 
belongs  to  Jesus  Christ. 

You  will  notice  also  that  that  other  description  of  the 
redeemed  is,  “In  their  life  was  found  no  guile/’  that  is  to 
say,  no  deceit.  They  were  like  Christ,  there  was  nothing 
crooked  about  them,  nothing  unworthy.  They  were  true 
at  all  costs.  That  was  the  description  of  them  when  they 
were  on  earth,  those  men.  Is  that  not  to  be  the  truth 
about  redeemed  ones  to-day  ?  A  disciple  is  a  man  who  is 
redeemed  in  character  and  who  is  right  in  conduct.  “They 
follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goes.” 

What  does  it  mean  practically  to  follow  the  Lamb?  I 
want  to  turn  you,  to  answer  that  question,  to  three  crises 
in  the  life  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  There  were  many 
crises  in  his  earthly  life,  and  you  can  study  them  at  your 
leisure  and  see  what  it  means  to  follow  the  Lamb ;  but  I 
want  to  give  you  three  crises  that  will  just  show  what 
following  the  Lamb  means  in  the  details  of  the  day’s  life. 

In  Matthew  9:11  our  Lord  was  sitting  at  meat  in  a 
house.  Publicans  and  sinners  were  with  him  and  there 
was  considerable  criticism  of  his  action  on  the  part  of  the 
Pharisees.  He  said  to  them,  “They  that  be  whole  need 
not  a  physician,  but  they  that  are  sick.  But  go  ye  and 
learn  what  that  meaneth,  I  will  have  mercy  and  not  sacri¬ 
fice:  for  I  am  not  come  to  call  the  righteous,  but  sinners 
to  repentance.” 

Notice  that  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  again  and  again 
broke  through  the  conventionalities  of  his  day  and  braved 
the  displeasure  of  the  people,  or  rather  of  the  religious 


118 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


people.  Why  ?  In  order  that  he  might  do  God’s  will  and 
bring  salvation  to  men  and  women.  Do  you  remember 
how  he  risked  his  reputation  as  a  Jew  that  day  when  he 
was  found  talking  to  the  woman  of  Samaria,  and  he 
risked  his  reputation  as  a  teacher,  as  a  prophet,  when, 
in  the  house  of  Simon  the  Pharisee,  he  allowed  the  woman 
sinner  to  touch  his  feet?  Here  he  risked  his  reputation 
as  a  proper-minded  person,  by  taking  dinner  with  pub¬ 
licans  and  sinners,  the  outcasts  of  society.  He  did  it  all 
to  bring  salvation  to  men. 

I  believe  to-day  that  to  follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever 
he  goes  will  mean  for  us  that  we  have  often  to  be  in 
positions  where  we  must  be  willing  to  be  misjudged,  and 
where,  perhaps,  we  have  to  risk  our  reputation  and  be 
called  names  by  the  circle  in  which  we  move.  But  what 
the  world  is  needing  to-day  is  less  conventionalism  and 
more  consecration  on  the  part  of  Christians ;  less  starch 
in  religious  life  and  more  salvation.  That  is  what  the 
world  is  needing. 

You  know  how  people  say,  “Well,  something  is  due  to 
custom.”  “You  will  offend  people  if  you  do  this  and 
do  that.”  “You  will  lose  in  business,  you  cannot  afford 
that.”  The  question  for  you  and  for  me  is,  are  we  pre¬ 
pared  to  be  uncompromising  and  when  the  thing  is  right 
to  follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  goes?  That  is  the 
test  of  our  discipleship.  Daniel  purposed  in  his  heart 
that  he  would  not  be  untrue  to  conscience  or  principle  or 
God  or  nation,  and  he  prospered.  In  the  days  of  the 
Reformation  there  were  men  of  different  degrees  of 
loyalty.  Erasmus,  for  instance,  said,  “Yes,  I  will  be  true 
to  God  as  far  as  the  customs  of  the  age  allow  me”;  but 
Luther  said,  “Here  I  stand,  I  can  do  nothing  else.  God 
help  me.” 

The  question,  as  vou  and  I  go  down  from  the  holy 
mount  is,  “Will  I  follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he  leads, 
although  it  means  risking  something,  although  it  means 
my  circle  calling  me  names  and  labeling  me  with  a  certain 
label?  Will  I  follow  the  Lamb?  Oh,  the  world  is  wait- 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


119 


ing  for  some  people  who  will  show  that  they  will  follow 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  no  matter  what  it  costs.  May  you 
and  I  be  among  the  number ! 

Let  me  turn  you  to  another  crisis,  Matthew  16 : 22, 
where  he  was  telling  his  disciples  that  Calvary  was  before 
him.  “Then  Peter  took  him,  and  began  to  rebuke  him, 
saying,  Be  it  far  from  thee,  Lord :  this  shall  not  be  unto 
thee.”  And  Peter  was  astonished  when  he  heard  his  Mas¬ 
ter  say,  “Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan.”  He  saw  who  was 
standing  behind  Peter,  and  who  was  egging  Peter  on  to 
hear  those  words. 

Here  was  the  crisis  in  Christ’s  life.  It  was  the  tempta¬ 
tion  to  shirk  the  cross.  “Far  be  it  from  thee,  Lord.  Spare 
thyself.  Pity  thyself.”  Although  He  saw  the  source  of 
it  behind  Peter,  I  am  sure  he  felt  it  was  very  hard  to  have 
to  speak  to  Peter  as  he  did ;  and  when  that  temptation 
comes  it  sometimes  comes  through  those  who  are  dear  to 
us,  and  it  is  always  hard  when  it  comes  through  somebody 
you  love  and  somebody  who  loves  you. 

I  met,  on  the  other  side  of  the  water,  a  splendid  young 
fellow  who  was  the  leader  of  a  Christian  band  in  his 
university  and  who  gave  himself  up  to  God  for  the  mis¬ 
sion  field.  One  morning  early,  his  father  came  into  his 
room  and  said  to  him,  “Your  mother  wants  you.”  He 
went  into  his  mother’s  room  and  his  mother  said,  “If  you 
go  to  Africa  it  will  be  over  my  grave.”  He  said,  “Oh, 
well,  mother,  if  that  is  how  you  feel  I  will  not  go.” 

What  was  the  result?  The  poor  fellow  went  back, 
back,  back,  back,  went  into  the  world  and  was  found 
standing  with  those  who  were  waiting  to  get  into  the 
theater,  this  fellow  who  had  been  the  leader  of  his  Chris¬ 
tian  companions  and  who  had  given  himself  up  to  God. 
Thank  God,  just  a  few  years  ago  he  got  to  know  the 
meaning  of  that  lovely  text,  from  that  lovely  message  that 
Calvary  means  Victory,  and  it  brought  him  back  to  God, 
and  he  is  now  just  in  the  hands  of  God  for  anything. 
But,  oh,  it  comes  hard  upon  one  when  the  temptation  to 


120 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


shirk  the  cross  finds  as  its  channel  the  lips,  the  heart,  the 
life  of  some  one  who  loves  you  and  whom  you  love. 

Notice  that  Christ  defines  discipleship  as  he  speaks  to 
Peter,  and  he  pushes  the  cross  into  the  forefront,  “If  any 
man  will  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself,  and  take 
up  his  cross  and  follow  me.,,  We  must  go  all  the  way 
if  we  are  to  be  disciples.  If  we  do  not  we  will  soon  lose 
sight  of  the  Master.  He  is  going  on.  We  must  be  pre¬ 
pared  to  go  with  him  through  the  garden  with  its  shadows 
and  its  struggles,  and  through  the  judgment  hall  with  its 
scourgings  and  its  scoffings,  and  up  to  the  cross  with  its 
shame  and  its  scorn. 

When  Oliver  Cromwell  was  going  into  battle,  his  great 
soldiers,  the  Ironsides,  waiting  for  his  commands  would 
look  at  him,  and  they  would  say  to  one  another,  “See,  he 
has  on  his  battle  face/’  and  they  too  got  the  battle  face 
as  they  looked  at  their  leader,  and  they  went  into  battle 
to  win  the  victory  for  God  and  for  country.  The  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  has  still  got  his  battle  face.  He  is  not  done 
fighting.  He  is  in  the  midst  of  a  tremendous  conflict  in 
the  heavenlies,  and  he  wants  you  and  me,  before  we  go 
farther,  to  take  a  new  look  into  the  face  of  our  leader  and 
catch  the  light  of  the  battle  face,  the  face  that  was  set 
steadfastly  to  go  to  Jerusalem.  The  face  always  speaks 
in  the  Christian  of  a  character  and  a  life  that  is  in  the 
grip  of  the  divine  power,  and  that  is  what  you  and  I  are 
needing,  that  means  victory. 

Oh,  will  you  follow  the  Lamb,  even  though  somebody 
tries  to  keep  you  back?  Will  you  say,  with  true  hearts, 
“Where  he  leads  me  I  will  follow,  I’ll  go  with  him,  with 
him,  all  the  way”? 

I  wonder  if  I  am  talking  to  someone  who,  at  a 
previous  convention,  or  somewhere  else,  yielded  him¬ 
self  or  herself  to  the  Lord  and  said,  “Yes,  I  will  follow 
Jesus  even  though  it  means  going  to  China”  ?  Then  there 
came  the  choice  of  two  roads,  and  you  took  the  lower,  you 
chose  the  second  best?  There  is  time  for  you  to  catch 
sight  of  the  leader’s  face,  and  the  Lord,  I  think,  is  saying 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


121 


to  you,  “Rise!  rise  and  follow  me.”  There  is  time  for 
you  to  undo  the  past  and  take  a  fresh  step  forward,  and 
once  again  put  your  life  into  the  hand  of  him  to  whom 
it  belongs.  Will  you  do  it? 

Let  me  remind  you  of  another  crisis  in  the  life  of  our 
Lord,  Matthew  22:15.  You  remember  they  came  to  him 
with  kindly  words,  one  day, — the  Pharisees, — words  that 
were  couched  in  flattering  terms,  but  they  were  all  a 
trap.  They  asked  him  whether  they  should  pay  the  tribute 
to  Caesar  or  not,  and  he  said,  “Show  me  a  penny.  Whose 
image  is  this  ?”  You  know  the  story.  What  was  the  crisis 
there  in  Christ’s  life?  What  was  the  temptation  our  Lord 
had  before  him?  Just  to  lower  the  standard  and  assent 
to  something  that  was  not  right,  in  order  that  he  might 
please  some  other  one.  They  would  have  said,  perhaps, 
“If  he  is  a  true  patriot  now,  he  will  say:  You  should  not 
pay  tribute  to  Caesar.”  There  was  the  temptation  to  lower 
his  standard  and  assent  to  what  was  wrong  in  order  to 
gain  the  good  opinion  of  those  men.  Is  not  that  a  tempta¬ 
tion  to-day  ?  I  believe  that  it  is  a  very  sharp  temptation 
in  business  circles. 

I  was  speaking  at  a  convention  in  England,  and  while 
walking  with  my  host,  a  keen  Christian  business  man,  he 
said,  “Do  you  know,  things  are  becoming  so  acute  in 
business  circles  that  it  will  soon  be  impossible  for  a 
Christian  man  to  continue  in  business  and  follow  the 
Lamb.”  I  believe  it  is  a  real  temptation  in  the  way  of 
business  men  to  lower  the  standard  a  little  bit.  I  believe 
it  is  a  tremendous  temptation  in  the  way  of  the  churches, 
and  they  are  yielding  to  it.  How  the  churches  are  lower¬ 
ing  the  standards  to-day!  What  extraordinary  methods 
some  of  the  churches  are  taking  to  raise  money,  proving 
to  the  world  that  they  have  no  God.  What  awful  means 
the  churches  are  using  to  attract  people  into  the  empty 
pews !  And  what  has  the  Church  of  God  to  do  with  the 
passing  program  of  a  world  that  hates  the  Christ?  By 
taking  up  the  world’s  program  the  church  is  proving  to 
the  world  that  she  has  no  God. 


122 


The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 


I  know  that  it  is  a  tremendous  temptation  to  the 
preacher  to  lower  the  standard  because  of  that  man  who 
sits  in  the  back  seat,  or  who  sits  in  the  front  seat  in  the 
gallery, — to  lower  the  standard  in  order  to  please  him, 
in  order  to  get  his  check,  and  so  on.  It  is  a  tremendous 
temptation  in  the  way  of  the  preacher  to  tone  down  his 
message.  Some  of  you  ought  to  be  preachers  just  to 
have  a  little  bit  of  sympathy  with  us  preachers.  If  you 
had  six  months  in  a  minister’s  study  and  in  a  minister’s 
church  you  would  never  criticize  him  again. 

It  is  not  an  easy  thing  to  see  people  going  away  from 
your  church  because  you  are  true  to  the  cross.  In  my 
first  church  I  had  nothing  to  preach  (and  I  have  never 
had  anything  to  preach)  except  the  cross,  and  I  saw  pews 
getting  empty  and  emptier,  and  people  going  away,  and  it 
was  a  hard  thing  for  a  young  fellow  just  beginning  his 
ministry  to  stand  true;  but  this  is  what  I  found,  and  it 
may  be  an  encouragement  to  some  ministerial  brother, 
I  began  to  take  notice  that  whenever  a  pew  in  the  church 
was  left  vacant  by  unconverted  people  leaving  it,  it  was 
very  soon  filled  with  converted  people  and  people  who 
would  go  out  to  the  street  with  me,  and  people  who  sup¬ 
ported  me,  and  people  who  gave  money.  You  know  you 
cannot  lose  if  you  are  true  to  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ, — 
you  cannot  lose  in  the  long  run. 

If  you  are  going  back  to  a  place  that  is  awfully  difficult, 
take  stock  of  God  before  you  go  back ;  and  if  you  will  get 
what  I  got  in  my  early  ministry,  this  fact  burned  in  your 
soul,  it  will  help  you.  I  got  this  from  God:  “God  is 
faithful,”  and  I  stood  on  that;  and  in  the  midst  of  very 
severe  tests  I  stood  on  that,  “God  is  faithful” ;  and  he 
proved  himself  to  be  so. 

How  did  Christ  meet  this  crisis  in  his  life — this  tempta¬ 
tion  to  lower  the  standard?  In  this  way:  “Render  unto 
Caesar  the  things  which  are  Caesar’s,  and  unto  God  the 
things  that  are  God’s.”  He  said  that  the  honest  demands 
of  the  state  are  as  holy  as  the  requirements  of  the  church. 
The  Bible,  remember,  has  only  one  word  about  a  thing, — 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


123 


it  is  either  right  or  wrong,  and  if  it  is  right,  then  we  want 
to-day  the  spirit  of  the  old  Puritans,  who  used  to  say, 
“Let  us  do  right,  though  the  heavens  fall.” 

Young  man  and  young  woman,  it  is  better  for  you  to 
go  down  with  your  flag  flying,  than  to  yield  to  the  tempta¬ 
tion  to  lower  your  standard  in  the  hope  that  you  will  please 
somebody.  But  you  won’t  go  down.  Jesus  is  stronger 
than  Satan  and  sin,  and  Satan  to  Jesus  must  bow.  You 
will  not  go  down. 

To  follow  the  Lamb  means  rigid  adherence  to  what  is 
right,  but  it  means  victory. 

Now  notice  what  God  says  is  to  be  the  end  of  those 
who  follow  the  Lamb.  They  are  to  be  without  blame 
before  the  throne.  That  is  what  God  is  working  up  to. 
In  the  midst  of  all  the  tests  of  your  lives  that  will  face 
you  remember  this :  Keep  your  eye  upon  the  throne.  It 
will  help  you  to  endure.  It  will  help  you  to  stand ;  and 
one  day  the  Lamb  will  lead  you  by  the  fountains  of  living 
waters,  and  God  will  wipe  away  all  your  tears. 

My  last  word  is  this.  How  are  we  to  do  it  ?  How  can 
you  and  I  go  back  and  follow  the  Lamb  whithersoever  he 
goes  ?  How  are  we  to  be  disciples  ?  In  our  own  strength 
and  wisdom?  No.  In  the  strength  that  we  get  from  such 
a  time  of  fellowship  as  this?  No,  blessed  though  it  is. 
I  will  read  two  verses  in  John’s  Gospel,  the  first  chap¬ 
ter:  “The  next  day  John  seeth  Jesus  coming  unto  him, 
and  saith,  Behold  the  Lamb  of  God,  which  taketh  away 
the  sin  of  the  world.  .  .  .  And  John  bare  record,  say¬ 

ing,  I  saw  the  Spirit  descending  from  heaven  like  a  dove, 
and  it  abode  upon  him.”  Now  join  those  two  passages 
and  you  have  the  secret  of  being  his,  able  to  follow  him. 
What  did  John  see?  The  Lamb,  on  whom  rested  a  dove, 
a  Lamb  indwelt  by  a  dove.  It  is  the  combination  of  those 
two  characteristics  that  will  give  us  power  to  follow  the 
Lamb  whithersoever  he  goes. 

The  mark  of  discipleship  is  a  Lamb  spirit  and  a  Lamb 
life.  That  is  the  result  of  making  Christ  first.  Let  me 
say  this  to  you  who  are  beset  by  difficulties,  who  are 


124  The  Meaning  of  the  Cross 

tried  by  very  hard  circumstances,  who  are  surrounded 
perhaps  by  ungodly  people,  who  are  being  tested  through 
and  through.  Beloved,  it  is  the  Lamb  life  that  Christ 
means  you  to  live,  and  it  is  the  Lamb  spirit  in  you  that  is 
going  to  win.  In  that  wonderful  vision  that  John  had  in 
the  fourth  chapter  of  the  Revelation,  he  heard  the  angel 
say,  “Behold,  the  Lion  of  the  tribe  of  Judah.”  And  John 
says,  “I  looked  for  the  Lion,  and  I  saw  a  Lamb”  Oh,  it  is 
the  Lamb  life  with  the  lion  courage  that  is  going  to 
conquer. 

As  you  go  to  your  work  or  out  to  the  mission  field, 
remember  this,  the  world  is  only  going  to  be  won  to 
Christ  by  lambs,  but  it  takes  the  heart  of  a  lion,  in  these 
days,  to  live  the  life  of  the  Lamb.  The  Lamb  life,  that  is 
obedience;  the  dove  life,  that  is  peace  and  power.  The 
lamb  means,  “Thy  will  for  me”;  the  dove  means,  “Thy 
power  in  me.”  And  so  we  come  face  to  face  with  the 
most  tremendous  question  we  can  ever  meet,  and  it  is  this  r 
Am  I  ready  to  follow  the  Lamb?  Am  I  ready  to  go  to 
my  home,  and  church,  and  business,  and  work,  and  fol¬ 
low  the  Lamb? 

Do  you  see  it  is  the  way  of  the  cross  ?  But  it  is  worth 
while.  Do  you  know  why?  The  future  belongs  to  the 
Lamb.  Calvary  means  Victory.  The  future  belongs  to 
the  Lamb,  and  he  is  going  on  to  victory.  He  is  here  now 
wanting  an  answer  to  this  question :  Will  you  follow  me? 
And  he  is  not  going  to  wait  for  an  answer,  he  must  have 
it  to-night.  Are  we  ready  to  give  that  answer?  Shall  we 
bow  in  prayer  before  him? 

Prayer 

0  Lord  Jesus,  thou  hast  been  asking,  “ Will  you  follow 
me  whithersoever  I  go”?  Thou  hast  heard  what  each  one 
of  us  has  said.  The  answer  may  cost  so  much,  but  we 
never  can  be  brought  into  a  position  where  we  do  not  find 
thee  with  us.  Oh,  we  thank  thee  for  it.  We  thank  thee 
thou  dost  not  say  “Go;”  thou  dost  say,  “ Follow  me.” 


The  Way  of  the  Cross 


125 


Blessed  Lord,  we  thank  thee  for  it.  Some  of  us  may 
be  just  a  little  nervous  about  the  future.  Give  us  grace, 
now,  to  say,  “I  believe  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  faithful, 
that  he  is  able  to  give  me  an  abundance  of  grace,  that  he 
is  able  to  make  all  grace  abound  towards  me,  whatever  be 
the  circumstances  of  my  life.  I  believe  God.”  O  Lord 
Jesus,  we  look  into  thy  face  and  we  see  the  face  of  him 
who  has  conquered  and  who  is  goinng  on  to  conquer. 

Do  thou  help  us  by  thy  grace  to  be  true  to  the  answer 
we  have  given  thee  through  these  days  and  in  this  closing 
service.  For  thy  name’s  sake,  Amen. 


DATE  DUE 


urn 

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GAYLORD 

PRINTED  IN  U..S.  A. 

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ERRATA 


This  book  was  prepared  from  a  stenographic  report  of  conference 
addresses;  owing  to  the  author’s  absence  from  America  proofs  were  not 
submitted  to  him,  and  a  number  of  errors  occurred  which  were  not  dis¬ 
covered  until  the  author  saw  the  completed  book.  The  most  important 
corrections  are  noted  below. 

Page  7,  line  13,  substitute  fall  for  foe. 

Page  9,  line  6,  substitute  conflict  for  conquering. 

Page  18,  line  7  from  bottom,  substitute  roots  for  riches. 

Page  21,  line  14  from  bottom,  substitute  Denney  for  Dowdell. 

Page  22,  line  10,  substitute  tell  for  at  all. 

Page  26,  lines  15  and  16  from  bottom,  substitute  hook  for  big. 

Page  29,  lines  2  and  8.  substitute  depth  for  death. 

Page  35,  line  22,  substitute  meet  for  met,  and  have  all  for  am  formed. 
Page  35,  last  line,  and  page  36,  line  2,  substitute  relationship  for  worship. 
Page  37,  last  line,  substitute  Lamb  for  altar. 

Page  38,  line  6  from  bottom,  substitute  thirteen  for  thirty. 

Page  53,  line  4  from  bottom,  substitute  which  for  and. 

Page  61,  lines  8  and  12,  substitute  angels  for  ages. 

Page  62,  line  18,  substitute  immovable  anchorage  for  manifold  testings. 
Page  63,  line  2  from  bottom,  substitute  whole  for  holy. 

Page  65,  line  6  from  bottom,  substitute  coin  for  court. 

Page  69,  lines  21  and  22  should  read,  which  commends  the  Redeemer, 
and  reveals  righteousness. 

Page  69,  line  10  from  bottom,  omit  position. 

Page  77,  line  13,  substitute  unchanged  for  necessary. 

Page  79,  line  19,  substitute  checks  for  chokes. 

Page  81,  line  6,  substitute  unreserved  for  unobserved. 

Page  87,  last  line,  substitute  Rain  and  rain  for  Ray  and  rays. 

Page  89,  line  22,  substitute  witness  for  wickedness. 

Page  93,  line  11  from  bottom,  omit  the  first  not. 

Page  101,  lines  17  and  19,  substitute  farm  and  farms  for  firm  and  firms. 
Page  109,  line  15,  substitute  for  for  of. 

Page  110,  line  10,  substitute  yielded  for  you,  with. 

Page  112.  line  13.  substitute  prophetically  for  practically. 

Page  117,  line  7,  omit  reden? ption. 

Page  119,  line  11,  substitute  speak  for  hear. 


